Knights of the Old Republic
by Chris Ganale
Summary: Will the hero of our story survive the misfortune that has befallen him? Furthermore, what will now become of Canderous Ordo's plan to get the party off Taris? Only time will tell the future.
1. The Star Wars

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away….

STAR  
WARS

KNIGHTS OF THE OLD REPUBLIC

Four thousand years before the rise of the Galactic Empire, the Republic verges on collapse. DARTH MALAK, last surviving apprentice of the Dark Lord Revan, has unleashed an invincible Sith armada upon the unsuspecting galaxy.

Crushing all resistance, Malak's war of conquest has left the Jedi Order scattered and vulnerable as countless Knights fall in battle, and many more swear allegiance to the new Sith Master.

In the skies above the Outer Rim world Taris, a Jedi battle fleet engages the forces of Darth Malak in a desperate attempt to halt the Sith's galactic domination….


	2. Orbital Engagement

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary aboard the Republic warship _Endar Spire_, drifting silently through space above the orbit of Taris, an Outer Rim world that was currently occupied by neither the Republic nor the Sith.

Inside the ship, crewmen continued with their normal lives. Chefs prepared meals, engineers tinkered with the engine mechanics, and the pilots on the bridge chatted about the most recent holodrama released on Coruscant as they allowed the ship's autopilot to carry them through the system.

Suddenly, the ship jolted as though a massive rancor had slammed its meaty fist into the side of the _Spire_'s hull. Alarm klaxons began wailing in time to the pulsing red alert lights throughout the ship.

"What the hell was that?" the _Spire_'s captain, a middle-aged native of Coruscant and veteran of the Mandalorian Wars, shouted. "Onasi, what's going on?"

"Sensors are showing a massive Sith war fleet dropping out of hyperspace, Captain," the pilot replied, his hands flying over his controls. "That shot was one of their cruisers disabling our shield generators. We're defenseless."

The captain swore. "We may be dead, but we can still be a nasty corpse." He turned to the row of crewmen along the right side of the bridge. "Gunners, get me firing solutions immediately. If we're going to go down, then I want them coming with us!"

"Captain," the sensor officer reported calmly, "Sith boarding craft are approaching from our guns' blind zone. Estimating contact in two minutes."

"Damn it. They _knew_ we were coming," the captain mused, then shook it off. "Comms, give me ship intercom."

"Ready, Captain."

"_All hands, this is the bridge,"_ the captain's voice boomed over the ship's intercom. _"We're under attack by a Sith war fleet, and we have transports incoming. All hands, prepare to repel boarders."_

Throughout the ship, this announcement sparked a riot of activity. Armed and armored soldiers rushed through the ship's corridors, moving toward security checkpoints and barricades set up near the points that the Sith boarders would likely enter the ship. In the galley, the chefs traded their cutting knives for blaster pistols, tipping over the tables they had been preparing food on and steeling themselves for the coming battle.

Then, the first of the Sith long-range bombardments began striking the unshielded ship.

---

A massive tremor rocked the vessel as the _Spire_'s portside engines exploded. The blast destroyed the coolant regulators, filling the engineering section with deadly coolant gas capable of searing the flesh right off a humanoid's bones. Crewmen died without realizing their peril as the hyper-pressurized coolant spread throughout the section within seconds.

Yet another alert klaxon wailed as the emergency blast doors sealed shut, containing the coolant from spreading to the rest of the ship, but trapping the poor crewmen who had somehow survived the escape of the coolant.

With no one able to control the engines, the still-firing starboard engines began to push the Republic warship into a flat spin, slipping sideways into the gravity well of Taris. The world then exacted its own punishment; the gravity of Taris twisted the spin of the _Endar Spire_ until it became a downward spiral into Taris' crushing embrace.

Another blast rocked the ship as the starboard engines finally detonated, but far too late to save the ship from the doom it was plummeting toward.

It was this blast that rocked through the crew quarters, shaking into wakefulness the only Republic soldier still aboard the ship who was not aware of or engaged in the current battle.

The soldier's dark blue eyes snapped open as another violent blast rocked the ship. He sat up on his small bunk, looking around to determine the cause of the commotion. Jumping off the bed, he ran to the nearest viewports, looking out at the vista of stars swirling around the axis of the ship.

As he watched, a quartet of Sith interceptors shot into his field of view, raking laser fire across the ship's hull. Swearing, the soldier dropped to his knees at the footlocker near the viewports, keying in his personal code. The seal popped open, and he lifted the lid, pulling out his clothing and personal weapons.

He quickly dressed himself, laying his blaster rifle on the floor as he slipped his combat vibroblade, a shorter, knife-sized version of the combat swords found throughout known space, into a sheath strapped to the side of his right boot.

The door to his quarters slid open. The soldier spun, still crouched, and leveled his blaster rifle on the figure standing at the door. Then, as he caught sight of the Republic colors that the soldier was wearing, he shifted the barrel of his weapon away.

"We've been ambushed by a Sith battle fleet," the soldier told him, checking the charge in his blaster pistol. "The _Endar Spire_ is under attack. Hurry up, we don't have much time!"

"Who are you?"

"I'm Trask Ulgo, ensign with the Republic fleet," the blond soldier replied, shifting his blaster pistol to his left hand to shake hands with the soldier. "I'm your bunk mate here on the _Endar Spire_. We work opposite shifts; I guess that's why you haven't seen me before."

Returning the pistol to his strong hand, Trask looked over his shoulder at the corridor behind him. "Now hurry up!" he said as he turned back to the soldier. "We have to find Bastila and make sure she makes it off the ship alive."

The soldier's right eyebrow rose slightly. "Bastila?"

"Bastila's the commanding officer on the _Endar Spire_," Trask answered. He paused, then shrugged. "Well, not an officer really. But she's the one in charge of this mission. One of our primary duties is to guarantee her survival in the event of an enemy attack. You swore an oath just like everyone else on this mission. Now it's time to make good on that oath."

Nodding, the soldier disabled the safety governor of his blaster rifle and motioned toward the open corridor. "Let's go, then."

The pair exited the crew quarters, weapons raised and at the ready, advancing toward the next closed door ten meters down the hall. As they advanced, a comlink attached to Trask's belt beeped, then a voice boomed out,

"_This is Carth Onasi. The Sith are threatening to overrun our position. We can't hold out long against their firepower. All hands to the bridge!"_

Trask swore a violent oath from the Corellian system. "That was Carth, the _Spire_'s pilot," he explained. "He's one of the Republic's best pilots. He's seen more combat than the rest of the ship's crew put together. If _he_ says things are bad, you better believe it. We have to get to the bridge to help defend Bastila."

The soldier nodded, then led the way, past an astromech unit trying to repair a power conduit, past several bulkhead panels that had shaken loose and fallen to the deck during all the fighting. The soldier stepped up to the next door, but nothing happened. He calmly reached over and keyed the manual release, but still nothing.

"Locked," he called over his shoulder to Trask.

"I don't have the override codes to open that door," he replied. "But I may be able to slice into the access system and open the door."

With a gesture from the soldier, Trask stepped forward and popped open the manual control panel, inserting a thin computer tool and probing around inside. Within a few moments, something clicked, and then the door slid open.

Just in time for the pair to watch a Republic soldier spin around to crash down into the deck plates, burned through with blaster fire. His combat instincts taking over, the soldier pulled Trask away from the door, then pressed himself against the near bulkhead.

Holding his blaster rifle in his left hand, he drew his vibroblade with the other and held it up near his face, allowing the corridor lighting to light up the reflective surface, effectively using the weapon as a mirror to show him what was around the corridor.

"Two Sith troopers," he whispered, sheathing the vibroblade again. "Blaster rifles. I'd say five meters down."

"They must be the advance boarding party," Trask replied. Suddenly, the blond man leapt out from behind the corner, his blaster pistol spitting hot red light at the troopers. "FOR THE REPUBLIC!"

Swearing under his breath, the soldier leaned out from cover, sighting down the barrel of his blaster rifle and firing a trio of bolts from his rifle. Letting out an anguished outcry, the Sith trooper on his left collapsed to the deck plates, three neat holes burned in his torso armor.

Shifting his sights around, the soldier quickly ducked back around the corner as a handful of bolts burned into the durasteel wall, boring holes into it. Leaning back out, he drew a careful bead and fired once. Moments later, the crash of metallic armor on the deck plates signified the end of the battle.

The soldier came around the corner, watching smoke rise from the charred crater in the second trooper's helmet. He turned to glare at his obviously-green comrade. "Don't ever do that again," he warned, pointing a finger menacingly at him.

With that, he passed the blond man and continued forward, carefully stalking toward the junction with the next corridor, which branched off to the right. As he approached, stepping over the Sith corpses, something exploded. Instinctively, he flattened himself to the wall, but as he glanced around the corner, he saw it had only been a T3 model astromech unit.

Next to the astromech fragments he saw a dead Republic soldier, obviously a higher rank than him, wearing experimental white body armor. He pointed Trask toward the corpse. "Put that armor on. If you're going to get yourself shot at, you may as well have some minor protection."

Trask grumbled something incoherently, but did as he was told. The other soldier kept watch as Trask pulled the complex armor sections on over his uniform. While Trask grumbled, the soldier rummaged around the corpse of one of the dead Sith, finding a frag grenade.

"That'll come in handy," he muttered, slipping it into a utility pouch on his belt.

As he turned around again, his comrade had finished donning the new armor. Shrugging, the soldier motioned him to follow and moved toward the next doorway. He flattened himself against the corridor wall by the manual access pad; taking a hint, Trask mirrored his move on the other side, then nodded that he was ready.

Returning the nod, the soldier triggered the manual opening of the doors. His precaution had saved them; a staccato hailstorm of blasterfire shot out of the doors, peppering the far corridor wall.

As Trask fired his pistol blindly into the room, the soldier pulled the grenade out of his belt, primed it, and then rolled into the room. He pressed himself further into the bulkhead and counted off seconds as the sound of the rolling grenade vanished beneath the hail of blasterfire.

"Grenade, grenade!" one of the Sith troopers cried.

_Too late,_ the soldier thought to himself.

The grenade exploded a few scant seconds later, the sound of its blast drowning out the outcries of the luckless troopers.

Sweeping into the room with his blaster rifle leading the way, the soldier found one of the Sith troopers crammed into a corner, his armor blackened and burnt by the explosion. The other was pitched haphazardly against the viewports, pieces of his armor shattered by the blast.

"Clear," he told Trask, then moved to the next doorway. Stopping in front of it, he placed his ear to the metal, listening for tell-tale signs of enemy movement beyond the door. He heard blasterfire.

Raising his weapon, he triggered the door open and stepped beyond it. Just before the curve of the corridor, he saw a Republic soldier crouching behind the corner for cover, leaning out to fire his weapon at unseen Sith boarders. Two more soldiers were standing in the open, firing their weapons on full-auto against the enemy troops.

Beyond the corner, he could hear the clash of full-on vibroswords, and then a scream of pain as one melee weapon or the other struck home. It sounded like a Republic trooper.

Suddenly, the farthest Republic soldier that he could see stopped firing, bringing his blaster rifle up to block the strike of a Sith vibrosword. The trooper's left foot lashed out, and the sound of boot impacting with synthmetal armor could be heard. The enemy stumbled back, allowing the Republic soldier to shift his grip on the rifle and swing it around like a club.

But before he could contact, a grenade exploded in their midst, killing all three Republic troopers and the Sith melee fighter.

Swearing a Corellian oath, the soldier shielded his face from shrapnel, then rushed in a crouch toward the corner. As he expected, the Sith trooper that had thrown the grenade, confident that he had taken out all the Republic forces, was advancing.

Oh how he wished he could've seen the face beneath that helmet when he leaned out, his blaster rifle spitting hot light. It was the last thing the Sith trooper ever saw.

The other trooper rushed forward, obviously intending to crush his skull in with his own rifle. But the soldier brought his rifle up, blocking the downward strike of the enemy. He released his own rifle, grabbing the Sith's right arm, and flipping him over and onto his back with a powerful hip toss. As the soldier laid there, stunned, Trask calmly shot the armored trooper in the face.

Nodding, the soldier recovered his own rifle and stood up, moving into the four-corridor intersection. From the door on his right, he could hear sounds of a melee scuffle. With a jerk of his head, he communicated to Trask that the doorway was their destination.

As the soldier got to work opening the door, Trask turned to see a trio of Sith troopers turning around the corner to their right, coming toward them. "We've got company!" the ensign warned, before pulling a grenade off his belt and lobbing it toward the troopers.

They scattered, but the grenade rolled off the curved wall of the corridor and bounced around after them. Moments later, the blast of the grenade rocked the intersection, not managing to drown out the death screams of the Sith troops.

Satisfied with himself, Trask turned around as the door opened, only to find himself joining his comrade, staring in open-mouthed shock at the scene that lay before them.

The hum and crackle of energy weapons filled the air before the two soldiers as they watched a Jedi female take on a Sith dark Jedi in a lightsaber duel, their azure and crimson blades sparking and hissing off one another.

"Dark Jedi," Trask muttered. "We better stay back. All we'd do is get in the way."

With a nod of compliance, the other soldier satisfied himself to watch the duel closely, studying their movements and footwork intently. The dark Jedi stepped back on his right foot, drawing power for a forward lunge with his blade, an attack which his counterpart deftly sidestepped, her blade sliding his away to ensure that it did not strike her as she spun around.

An explosion rocked the corridor, causing the Jedi to stumble. Pressing his advantage, the dark Jedi lunged at her again. But almost as if she could read his movements, she took a small step to the side, letting the crimson blade sweep past her left side. Before the dark Jedi could withdraw, she looped her arm over, then under his, grabbing him by the shoulder of his tunic and trapping his sword arm in place.

"He's done," the soldier commented, off-hand. "No way he can break that hold."

"You sure about that?" Trask asked. "He _is_ a dark Jedi after all."

"Force can't help you if you're trapped like a gizka," his companion answered, shaking his head. "Watch."

The young ensign did so, watching wide-eyed as the Jedi drew back her own sword arm, swinging it laterally toward the dark Jedi. At the last moment, both men glanced away as the sound of lightsaber shearing through human flesh accompanied an explosion somewhere on the ship.

As the dark Jedi's body dropped to the deck with a thud, the victorious Jedi turned toward the two soldiers, opening her mouth to speak. Before she could get a word out, a massive explosion blasted a hole through the side of the corridor, all the way out into space. Killed instantly by the explosion, the Jedi's corpse was sucked out into the void, as was that of the dark Jedi and two still-living Sith troopers.

A magnetic containment shield activated over the hole in the wall, removing the danger of the two soldiers being sucked out as well. In silence, the two made their way to the wound in the side of the ship, looking out through the blue glow of the shield as the bodies sailed away into space.

Trask shook his head slowly and sighed. "We sure could've used her help."

"No time to worry about that now," the soldier replied. "Escape's the name of the game."

"Right," Trask replied with a nod, following his comrade forward. He pointed to the only working door in the corridor. "That door leads to the bridge. It'll be close quarters in there, so I suggest melee weapons."

"Or, we could let _them_ use the melee weapons, and we blast them before they get to us."

"Or we could do that," the ensign nodded.

"Be on your toes," the soldier warned, drawing his combat vibroblade and snapping it into a specialized groove on his blaster rifle, enabling the blade of the weapon to protrude beyond the barrel. "No plan survives initial contact with the enemy. The only plan we should count on here is _react_."

Trask nodded, revising his opinion of his comrade. Sure, he'd known that the soldier had gotten top scores in all his training exams, and had seen some of the fiercest fighting in the Mandalorian Wars, but this man was wise beyond his rank and his years. At least, in terms of causing other sentient beings to become one with the Force.

"Ready?" the soldier asked.

"As ever."

Trask keyed the access panel for the bridge doors, and everything seemed to fall into slow motion for the soldier. He leapt over the slowly-retreating doors, his first victim already chosen.

In front of him, no more than two meters, a Sith trooper was turning slowly, trying to bring his vibrosword around toward the new threat. No time; the soldier's vibroblade-augmented blaster rose up, the metallic point of the weapon driving up under the Sith's arm, where they had no armor plating to protect them. The blade sank deep into the trooper's armpit, severing the major artery within.

The soldier kicked his first victim off of his vibroblade, then ducked his upper body as a second trooper's vibrosword sliced through the air where his head had been. As the Sith tried to bring his blade back around, the soldier struck, his own weapon point stabbing up beneath the enemy trooper's helmet, directly into the sensitive area where jaw meets throat.

His vibrosword clattering to the deck, that trooper pressed both hands up against his helmet, desperately trying to stem the flow of blood from the mortal wound as he staggered away.

Ducking behind a bridge console, the soldier calmly slid his vibroblade out of its special groove as Sith blasterfire hammered the other side of his console. Trask let off a volley of shots to scatter the remaining two soldiers, a diversion the other man took advantage of.

Standing just enough to look over the console, the soldier waited until the Sith troopers came out from behind cover. One of them took a blaster bolt from Trask's pistol to the chest, grunting as he spun away and collapsed to the deck.

The other trooper simply stopped shooting, stumbling back in shock. His blaster rifle clattered to the deck as his trembling hands reached up to his forehead and grasped something there. He pulled once, then stared at the bloody weapon lying across his palms. He got as far as realizing that the soldier had hurled his vibroblade across the bridge, then fell back, dead.

Wordlessly, the soldier stood up, moving to the Sith corpse and retrieving his vibroblade. Wiping the blood off of it on the dead man's uniform, he calmly slid it back into the sheath on his boot and looked up at Trask, whose wide-eyed expression told him exactly what the ensign thought of his combat skills.

Shrugging, the soldier looked around, looking to see if any of the Republic bodies wore Jedi clothing. No luck; none of them were even female. "She's not here," he reported calmly, then checked the charge of his blaster rifle. "Back to hunting for us."

"They must have retreated to the escape pods," Trask confirmed. "We'd better get there too. The Sith want Jedi Shan alive, but once they realize that she's not on the ship anymore, it'll be no more than space dust."

"Sounds like good incentive to me," the soldier said, already keying the access pad to the other set of doors off the bridge.

Ahead of them was an empty corridor. As they moved into it, a burst of laser fire, presumably from one of the Sith capital ships, completely blew away the forward section of the bridge. Air screamed through the small corridor they were in, drawn out into the void along with whatever corpses hadn't been vaporized in the attack.

Instinctively, the soldier's right hand latched onto a cable running the length of the corridor at shoulder level, securing him in place against the howling vortex. Behind him, Trask grabbed him by the wrist of his left hand, keeping himself from sailing into space as well.

The blast doors they had just came through finally sealed shut, removing the danger of death by asphyxiation. Letting go of the cable he had grabbed onto, the soldier looked at the closed blast door, then shook his head slowly. "Trask, what is it with us and almost taking swims out in the void?"

"It's a habit we do need to shake," the ensign replied, nodding sagely. "Not good for our health, or so the medics say."

"Pah," the soldier said, keying the access panel into the next room. "What do they know?"

As the pair entered the room, the soldier turned immediately toward the first door on the left, which would lead to the starboard section and the escape pods. Trask, however, walked toward the far door, which led back toward the docking bay.

"Hey, Trask," the soldier said. "Escape pods are this way."

"No, there's something behind here," Trask muttered, easing up on the doorway.

Before he could get to it, the doors slid open, revealing a black-garbed figure, with a bald head and a black beard. This man reached to his left hip, drawing and igniting a crimson-bladed lightsaber.

"Damn! Another dark Jedi. I'll try to hold him off," Trask said, scooping up a discarded vibrosword from the floor. "You get to the escape pods!"

With that, the brave ensign charged through the doors. They slid shut behind him, and an explosion of sparks from the control panel told him that the door wasn't opening again. Sighing, the soldier resigned himself to his comrade's fate, then stepped through the doors leading to the starboard section of the ship.

As soon as the doors had closed behind him, a faint voice began to issue from his comlink, mindful of the thought that he could be attempting to stealth past the Sith. _"This is Carth Onasi. I'm tracking your position through the _Spire_'s life support systems. Commander Shan's escape pod is away, and you're the last surviving crewman on the ship. You have to get to the escape pods now; I can't wait much longer."_

"Oh," the soldier said to himself, not responding over the comlink. "Well that's great."

He crept up to the right curve of the corridor, then peeked around the corner, quickly pulling his head back. One Sith trooper. No issue. The soldier stepped out from behind the corner, his blaster rifle blazing. A pair of bolts caught the lone trooper in the gut, drilling through his armor and body and hurling him to the deck plates.

At the intersection the trooper had been guarding, he turned left, shielding his face with his right arm as a series of power couplings in the other door went off, sending flashes of electricity out into the corridor.

Crouching down at the rightmost wall-mounted panel into the next door, the soldier readied his blaster rifle, then triggered the panel left-handed. The door slid open, and before it had even opened all the way, his blaster rifle kicked once, and the faceplate of a Sith trooper fragmented, burned completely through by the blaster bolt. The trooper dropped.

There was another soldier in the room, hammering the door jamb with blasterfire. As he waited for the trooper to stop shooting, he caught sight of one of the crates on the floor, labeled "WARNING! EXPLOSIVE ORDNANCE! KEEP AWAY FROM HEAT!"

He swore. This was the ordnance room. Any stray shots would blow this whole section of the ship out to the void.

Drawing his vibroblade left-handed, he reared back and threw his rifle into the room. The ploy worked; the trooper stopped shooting as he watched the weapon skid into the room. He switched the blade to his right hand, then came around the door frame and ran forward, charging at the trooper at top speed.

The armored man saw him, tried to bring his blaster in line, but he was already atop him. Slamming into his midsection, the soldier felt something in his shoulder give way as the momentum of his charge lifted the trooper up. Locking his arms around the man's waist, the soldier lifted him up, then slammed him back into the deck as hard as he could.

Dazed, the Sith's blaster clattered away, his head lolling to the side. The soldier's vibroblade came around, slashing open the armored man's throat. His upraised left hand blocked most of the blood from squirting into his face.

Standing up, the soldier worked his right shoulder testingly, wincing in the process. Dislocated. He should've known better than to shoulder-tackle an armored Sith trooper. Ensuring that there was no blood on his vibroblade, the soldier sheathed it, then took his right elbow in his left hand. He paused for a moment, readying himself, then shoved upward with all his strength.

A loud _CRACK_ echoed through the ordnance room, and the soldier grunted. He circled his shoulder once, satisfied that it would at least work properly. He retrieved his blaster rifle, then turned to enter the next room.

"_Be careful,"_ Carth's voice called out from the communicator. _"There's a whole squad of Sith soldiers on the other side of that door. You'll have to find some way to thin their numbers."_

Wordlessly, the soldier walked up to the security panel near the door, entered his ID, then pulled up a security monitor of the adjacent room. Four Sith soldiers and one higher-ranking Sith non-commissioned officer. Two of the soldiers were working on getting the far door, not the one he was near, open, while the NCO watched. The other two soldiers were looting the dead Republic soldiers in the room.

"Hmm," the soldier mused, calling up a list of all the security features in that room. "What can I do to…oh."

The other room, like the one he was standing in, was an ordnance room. As per Republic safety regulations, there had to be a failsafe mechanism to vent the entire room to space should there be a breach of any explosive ordnance. Better to lose a few crewmen than the entire ship, after all.

"Now, let's just sent this emergency vent procedure," he muttered to himself as he worked. "Slice in a false ordnance breach and…"

The holocam view showed red warning lights flashing in the room, before a seal in the starboard bulkhead split open, exposing the entire room to the vacuum of space. Several of the Sith screamed in abject terror as they were sucked out into the void, their screams quickly dying out; unable to carry against the vacuum. The Sith NCO managed to grab hold of the task bench in the center of the room, but one of the Republic corpses slammed full on into him, its dead weight loosing his grip and sending them both into space.

"Beautiful," the soldier said, activating the emergency override to seal the room again. He waited until pressure and oxygen had been cycled back into the room, then stepped through, and crossed quickly to the far door.

The door slid open for him, revealing the owner of the voice that had guided him so far. "Nice trick venting the ordnance room to space!" he said, then stuck out his right hand. "Carth Onasi. Good to meet a man with a grasp of tactics."

Nodding, the soldier switched his rifle to his left hand and shook the pilot's hand. Strong grip, fast shake; he made no effort to attempt a show of strength. "Kagi Vayun, Republic SpecForces commando."

Carth's eyebrows shot up at that comment. "So _that's_ why they assigned you to this mission," he said, then waved that thought off. "No matter. You made it just in time. We've only got one escape pod left, so now would be a good time to use it and get off this crate. We can hide on the planet below."

"You'll get no argument from me," Kagi replied, moving to the control panel of the escape pod and keying in the activation sequence. It was a sequence that he, like every other sentient being employed by the Republic, could perform in his sleep. The entrance doors of the pod slid open. "Anyplace is better than here. After you, pilot. You'll be flying us, after all."

Nodding, Carth entered the escape pod first, taking his position at the rudimentary controls of the craft. Kagi checked one last time to make sure they were clear, then stepped into the pod and sealed the hatch behind him.

"We clear?" Carth asked.

"Clear," Kagi answered. "Move it, driver. Get us out of here."

---

The outer hatch of the escape pod launch tube irised open, allowing the ovoid escape vehicle shoot out of the _Endar Spire_'s embrace on a jet of blue flame. Inside the pod, Carth piloted the little craft to the best of his ability, while Kagi peered out the viewports at the rapidly-shrinking _Endar Spire_.

As he watched, a Sith battle cruiser slid up alongside the Republic ship, as though intending to dock with it. But then a vicious broadside of the Sith cruiser's turbolasers raked the crippled vessel. Two more broadsides followed, cutting deep scars across the _Spire_'s armor and lighting fires as fuel and ordnance stores were detonated. Kagi watched in mild fascination as the ordnance rooms he had been through went up with a minor flash of orange light.

Finally, as a fourth broadside raked the _Endar Spire_, her reactor core gave out, explosions spreading through the ship, before one final explosion shattered the mighty war vessel, flinging airspeeder-sized chunks of durasteel through space.

The Sith cruiser was only buffeted slightly by the explosion's shockwaves.

"Hang on," Carth called back to him. The soldier turned around, just in time to see flames sparking off the forward edge of the ship. "We're entering the atmosphere now. It's going to be rough."

Kagi silently sat down and strapped himself in, securing his blaster rifle in a storage bin beneath his seat. This is always the part he hated about space travel…

* * *

**A/N:** And so it begins. This is, without doubt, the most massive project I'll ever undertake. Nothing too much to say here, 'cept that Kagi's pretty much a super soldier, inspired a lot by Heero Yuy. You know, the ability to pop bones and shit back into place without really caring. 

Also: Two homage lines to Battlefront I are in there. Find them if you can. :D

Oh, one more thing: Consider this a pimp for my new forums. XD


	3. Dreams and Realities

_**She was beautiful.**_

_**Her skin was the color of sunrise on Alderaan, her hair as dark, and doubtless as soft, as the finest bantha wool coat that credits could buy. And her eyes. Her eyes were the color of Corellia's southern ocean, and they burned with determination.**_

_**Her head dropped down, a blade of crimson energy passing through the space where it had been just a moment ago. As she came back up, she struck with her own weapon, a sword of pure energy, its color that of a fine Corellian whiskey.**_

_**Red met dark yellow in a rainbow of flashing lights and sparking energy. She stepped forward, parrying, riposting, and striking out. Her opponent gave ground, his defensive movements becoming increasingly frantic.**_

**_She struck down at her enemy, hard. His blade intercepted hers, barely, and he could not muster the strength to parry. She swept her blade along and under his, batting it up into the air. Then she slashed her blade down, leaving an angry energy score across his chest. Lifeless, he fell._**

_**She watched him fall for a moment, then lifted her eyes up to another threat, her determination glowing brighter in her eyes. Her stance shifted. She spun her lightsaber around her right hand, holding the weapon in a one-handed grip.**_

_**She was beautiful…**_

---

He opened his eyes slowly, taking in the unfamiliar surroundings. For a few brief moments, he had no idea why he wasn't on his bunk in the _Endar Spire_. Then flashes of the battle came back to him. Grenades exploding, almost getting shot into space three times, Trask buying him the time to escape. He sighed. Why had the fool gone and challenged that dark Jedi?

"You up?" a voice called out to him. "It's about time. You've been asleep for a few days. Must've been a nice dream."

The soldier thought back to the dream, to the beautiful Jedi woman. The corner of his mouth twitched up in a smirk. "Yeah, it was pretty nice," he said. "Beautiful woman, people getting killed. Soldier's paradise, right?" He chuckled, then schooled his features into seriousness. "Didn't feel like a dream though. More like a vision."

"I'm not surprised. You took a nasty blow to the head. You're probably having all kinds of strange dreams. I wouldn't worry about any of it, though."

Kagi sat up on the hard bed, swinging his legs over the side and planting his booted feet on the floor. He noticed for the first time that he was still wearing his full gear. _Must've been hell on my back,_ he mused, considering the equipment pack he always carried.

"So what's the sitrep?" he asked, looking over at Carth, sitting in one of the room's chairs.

"You've been slipping in and out of consciousness for a few days," the pilot replied, shrugging. "We're pretty safe here, for the moment. We're in an abandoned apartment on Taris. You were banged up pretty bad when our escape pod crashed, but I got out of it okay."

Carth stretched, finished off the ration pack he'd been eating out of, and tossed it into a nearby trash bin. "I dragged you away from the crash site in all the confusion, and stumbled on this apartment complex. We were long gone when the Sith got there."

"Thanks," Kagi said, pulling his equipment pack off and rummaging through it. "I owe you one."

"You don't have to thank me," the pilot replied, waving it off. "I've never abandoned anyone on a mission, and I'm not about to start now. Besides, I'm going to need your help."

"Why?" the soldier asked, producing a ration pack, which he promptly dug into.

"Taris is under Sith control. Their fleet is blockading the planet, and their soldiers patrol the streets. They've declared martial law and imposed a planet-wide quarantine. There's no way the Republic would be able to get anyone through the Sith blockade to help us. If we're going to find Commander Shan and get off this world, we're it."

"Commander Shan?" Kagi repeated, confused.

"Commander Bastila Shan," Carth explained. "She's a Jedi Knight, and was with the strike team that killed Darth Revan, Malak's Sith master. Commander Shan is the key to the entire Republic war effort. The Sith must have found out we were moving her through this system, and they struck the _Endar Spire_ with everything they had. She was in one of the escape pods that made it to the planet. For the sake of the Republic, we've got to find her."

"Sold me," Kagi said with a nod, tossing the empty ration pack into a garbage bin. "Where do we start?"

"I did some scouting around while you were out," Carth replied, standing up and rummaging through the lockbox near his chair. "There are reports of some escape pods crashing into the Undercity. That sounds like a good place to start. It's a dangerous place, though. We won't do Commander Shan any good if we get ourselves killed."

The soldier smirked. "I was SpecForces, Lieutenant. I've been to places where the floor would kill you just walking on it the wrong way. I'm not too worried."

"I know," Carth replied. He pulled two blaster pistols and a blaster rifle, Kagi's own blaster rifle, from the lockbox. "I read your service record. Still, caution's a good idea."

"I was just messing around, Carth," Kagi said, taking his rifle and checking the charge. "No need to get personal about it."

"Sorry," the pilot said. He looked as if he wanted to say more, but didn't. he changed the subject instead. "We can use this apartment as a base, and we can probably get some more supplies in the Upper City. We just need to remember to keep a low profile."

He shuddered once, his voice becoming haunted. "I've heard stories about dark Jedi interrogation techniques. They say the Force can do terrible things to a mind. It can wipe away your memories and destroy your very identity."

An unconscious shiver ran through Kagi as he said those words, causing the soldier's right hand to unconsciously twitch in a swirling pattern. His brows furrowing, the soldier tightened his hand into a fist, and held it until it stopped shaking.

"We should be alright if we don't do anything stupid," Carth continued, oblivious to his partner's reactions. "After all, they're looking for Commander Shan, not a couple of grunts like us. Ready to go?"

Kagi stood up, shouldering his equipment pack. He slipped a new power pack into his blaster rifle, then nodded at Carth. "You bet. Let's roll."

The pair made their way to the doorway leading out, and Carth obligingly triggered it open. He likewise triggered the outer door, and then they were out in a hallway.

"Right, you alien scum, against the wall!" a gruff voice called out from the corridor. "This is a raid!"

The two Republic soldiers stepped out, watching the Sith officer and two battle droids harass a pair of blue-faced Duros. The Duros did not have noses, lending them a mournful look that was only amplified by the predicament these two found themselves in.

"There was a patrol here just yesterday," the Duros on the right said in easily-understandable Basic. "And they found nothing. Why do you Sith keep bothering us?"

The Sith officer sneered contemptfully at the alien, then raised his blaster rifle and triggered a pair of shots, both bolts burning through the Duros, knocking him back and down. "That's how we Sith deal with smart-mouthed aliens," the officer sneered. He turned to the other Duros. "Now you, get against the wall before I lose my temper again!"

Out of the corner of his eye, the officer caught the movement of Kagi drawing his vibroblade, and placing his blaster rifle on the ground. "What's this? Humans hiding out with aliens?" Then, he caught sight of the Republic uniform that Carth was wearing. "They're Republic fugitives! Atta–"

Kagi's flying form interrupted the officer's order, as the soldier barreled him straight to the floor, his blade driving into man's throat. Blood shot from the wound, causing Kagi to shift his head to the right or catch it in the face. He twisted the blade in the man's throat, at once severing his trachea and all the major blood vessels to his brain.

Behind him, Carth had snapped up both his blaster pistols, and was unleashing a withering fire against both droids. Seeing his comrade's predicament, Kagi lashed out with his right boot, sweeping the leftmost droid's feet out from under it, sending it crashing to the floor with a clatter of metal.

The soldier leapt onto the back of the droid as Carth shifted both of his pistols onto the remaining droid, burning through its armor plating and coring the control cluster, sending the droid crashing down.

Grabbing onto the plates of metal on the droid's face, Kagi pulled back with all his might. The sound of metal shrieking and rending filled the hallway, before the soldier managed to peel back the armor plating like the rind of a fruit.

Carth obliged him by taking careful aim and firing a single pistol blast into the droid's control brain, effectively killing it.

Standing up, Kagi retrieved his vibroblade from the throat of the dead Sith officer, wiping the blood off on the corpse's uniform before sliding it back into his boot sheath. Carth walked up beside him, pistols holstered, holding out the soldier's blaster rifle. He took it with a nod, then turned to the remaining Duros.

"Poor Ixgil," he said in his own language, one of the many that Kagi understood. "He should never have talked back to that Sith. Thankfully, you were here to step in and help me, human. This isn't the first time the Sith have come here to cause trouble for us, but hopefully it will be the last."

"Won't somebody come searching for this patrol?" Kagi asked, gesturing to the carnage.

"Don't worry about the bodies," the Duros answered. "I will move the bodies so it will look like they were killed elsewhere. With any luck, they won't be bothering us for a while."

"I much appreciate that, Friend Traveler," Kagi said, using the Duros honorific. Then he shouldered his blaster rifle and motioned for Carth to follow him.

They walked around the curving corridor for a few meters, passing by a green-skinned Twi'lek standing next to a bunch of plasteel cylinders and a vender's rack. Just before they passed him, the Twi'lek looked up, saw them, and called out in Basic, "Well, don't see too many of your kind around here. Most of the residents in this rundown old apartment are illegal aliens. My name is Larrim, by the way."

"Good to meet you, Larrim," Kagi replied.

"I know it's really none of my business," Larrim said, lowering his voice considerably.

"Here it comes…" Carth groaned.

"You look like someone who might need to purchase one of those new energy shields," Larrim continued, eying the soldier's gear that Kagi was wearing. "They're the latest thing, you know. Very high tech."

The two Republic soldiers exchanged a glance, then Kagi said, "I know about energy shields."

"Ah, I see," the Twi'lek replied. "Very knowledgeable then, you are. Well, you might be interested to know that I have one for sale. It's not cheap, but it could mean the difference between life and death."

"Maybe some other time," Kagi said. "We don't exactly have a large flow of credits right now."

"Understandable," Larrim said, his _lekku_ twitching slightly. "Regrettable, but understandable. Is there anything else I might do for you?"

"Some questions, if you don't mind?"

The Twi'lek hesitated. "Questions? I'd rather not. Most of the residents here are illegal aliens, so questions are frowned on. If it's questions you want answered, go talk to Kadir, the janitor."

As Larrim turned back to his wares, the two soldiers continued on. "Think we should try looking up this Kadir fellow?" Kagi asked.

"Probably not," Carth replied as they neared the door out of the apartments. "It'd just cost us more time."

"Good point," the soldier said, tapping the access panel for the door. It slid open, and Kagi gestured for Carth to precede him.

They passed through another set of doors, and then were out on the upper level of Taris. Kagi stopped to look around the square they were in, and the city itself. Huge buildings hundreds of stories high shot up on all sides of the plaza they were standing on. Off to their right, just barely balanced on the edge of the plaza, was an escape pod.

Kagi pointed to it. "That ours?"

"Yep," Carth answered.

"Made a mess, didn't we?"

"Definitely."

"Well, no time like the present. Let's move on, shall we?"

Carth nodded, and the two headed to the left, walking lengthwise across the plaza. As they walked, Kagi noticed a high number of Sith troopers marching around, weapons boldly displayed.

"Lot of Sith troopers around," he remarked.

"The planet is under Sith control," Carth answered. "Let's just act casual and maybe they'll leave us alone."

"Good plan. So, know anything else about this world?"

The pilot waited to answer until they had passed by a Sith trooper, then replied, "The planet's all one big city. Its golden years are long past it, however, and things have gotten worse since the Sith occupied it."

He quieted again as a pair of Sith troopers passed them, then looked back over his shoulder before continuing, "From what I hear, the wealthy live on the tops of all the tall towers. And if you're poor, you live down in the shadows. And it gets worse the lower you go." He shrugged. "That's all I can think of, at any rate."

By now, they had reached the other side of the plaza, marked by a fountain with a strange floating statue hovering in midair over it. To their left was a sealed door that read "Upper City, North" and on their right, an open door whose sign read "Clinic" in Basic and a number of alien languages.

"Let's try the north side of the city," Kagi said, turning toward the sealed door.

As he approached it, he caught the tail end of an encounter between two bounty hunters and a civilian man.

"…missed your last payment," the human bounty hunter said.

"Davik doesn't like you missing payments," the Aqualish hunter commented in his own language.

"Here, I've got fifty credits," the human said, holding the money out in trembling hands. "A down payment. That should buy me some time, right?"

"Sorry," the human said, shaking his head. "You're out of time. It's all or nothing. Davik can't have people not paying his debts."

"Bounty hunters," Carth muttered to Kagi. "Scum of the universe. I hate it when they push people around like this."

"Me, too," Kagi said, then turned and strode toward the encounter.

"What are you doing?" the pilot hissed.

"Trust me," the soldier replied, grinning back at his comrade.

"…How can I give you credits I don't have?" the man was saying.

"That's too bad," the Aqualish said. "Davik's going to want to make an example of you. You're coming with us."

"Hold on a second," the human said. "Looks like we've got ourselves a couple witnesses here."

"Davik doesn't like witnesses," the Aqualish said.

Kagi gave the alien a piercing glare. "Hey, ass-face. Until you learn how to say something original, why don't you let the grown-ups talk?" He he turned his attention back to the human bounty hunter. "Now here's the deal. You're going to leave this man alone, or I'm going to introduce your face to the permacrete."

"Guess we're going to have to teach you to mind your own business," the human replied, raising his blaster pistol.

He never got it lined up. Kagi surged forward, his armored fist driving hard into the man's nose. The man dropped his blaster with a shrill shriek, his hands going to his nose. Sliding past him, the soldier swept the bounty hunter's feet out from under him, then moved on to his Aqualish partner as the man hit the ground with a heavy whoosh of air from his lungs.

The alien tried to line his blaster up with Kagi, but the soldier grabbed his wrist and stepped past him, pulling out to his right side while pushing down on his shoulder. This bent the alien partially over, with his blaster arm at an awkward angle behind him. Kagi pulled, hard, and a cracking sound in the alien's shoulder accompanied his watery shriek. The blaster dropped from numbed fingers. Letting go of the alien's wrist with his right hand, he formed it into a tight fist and drove it into the base of the alien's skull. He dropped like a sack full of tubers.

"Thank you!" the harassed man exclaimed as Kagi began to search the downed bounty hunters. "I owe you my life! These bounty hunters were going to take me away and kill me. My wife warned me not to take a loan from Davik. It's not good to owe a crime lord money. He'll just keep sending more bounty hunters after me until I'm dead."

"How much was it that you owed?" Kagi asked, rummaging through the pockets of the human hunter now.

"Uhh, a hundred credits," the man answered.

"Here you go," Kagi said, holding up the stack of credit chips he had collected from the bounty hunters, totaling one hundred credits. "Take it."

"Just like that?" the man asked as he accepted the credit chips. "Thank you!"

"You're giving him a hundred credits?" Carth asked. "Generous."

"Now I can pay off Davik," the man continued, clutching the credits as though they were the most precious commodity in the universe. "You've saved my life! Thank you! I'll take these credits to him right away."

The man turned, keying open the accessway to the north side of the upper city, and ran through. Shrugging, the two Republic soldiers followed. Once through, Kagi noted that the north side looked nearly identical, save for a few swoop bikes here and there.

In silence, the two made their way toward the west end of the plaza. As they walked, Kagi suddenly turned to look over his shoulder at Carth. The pilot seemed to be troubled by something; there was a thoughtful expression on his face.

"So, Carth, while we're spending all this time touring scenic Upper City, why don't you tell me a bit about yourself?" Kagi asked.

"Me?" The pilot shrugged, seeing no harm in it. "I've been a star pilot for the Republic for years, and I've seen more than my share of wars. I fought in the Mandalorian Wars before all this started."

Carth shook his head, and an edge appeared on his tone. "But with all that, I've never seen anything like the slaughter these Sith animals unleash. Not even the Mandalorians were that senseless. My homeworld was one of the first to fall to Malak's fleet. The Sith bombed it into submission, and there wasn't a damn thing the Republic could do to stop them."

"Sithspit Carth, I didn't know," Kagi said, turning a corner at the west end of the plaza and heading north again. "I didn't mean to bring up bad memories."

"I'm just a soldier," Carth replied, shaking his head slowly. "I go where the fleet admirals tell me to. I follow my orders and I do my duty. It's just…" He sighed once, and shook his head again. "It doesn't seem right that doing that means I failed them. I didn't!"

"Pump the braking thrusters, man," Kagi said, holding his hands out placatingly. "I didn't mean to piss you off."

"Well, I know," Carth said, stumbling over his words in a haste to make amends for snapping off. "Don't worry about it. I just… must not be making much sense. You probably mean well with your questions; I'm just not accustomed to talking about my past much. At all, actually. I'm more used to taking action, keeping my mind focused on the business at hand. So let's just do that. If you have more questions, ask them later."

"Sounds good to me," Kagi said, passing under the archway and turning right around the wall.

Ahead of them, a Sith soldier stood guard in front of a doorway. Possibly a way down to the lower city? Only one way to find out.

"This elevator is off-limits," the soldier called out as they approached. "Only Sith patrols and those with proper authorization are allowed into the Lower City. It's obvious from the way you're dressed that you're not a patrol, so unless you have the proper authorization papers you must move along."

Without a fuss, the two Republic soldiers turned and walked away from the elevator and the Sith guard.

"Well, we found our way down," Kagi said.

Carth nodded. "We're going to have to find some kind of a disguise if we want to get past this guy." The pilot frowned. "We're going to need a couple Sith uniforms. But where are we going to get them?"

"We could always jump some soldiers."

"Yeah, but we'd have to be discreet about it. If we attack them in broad daylight they'd wipe us out."

Kagi rubbed his chin thoughtfully as they strolled back out into the plaza. "Hey, remember how we saw that Sith patrol picking a fight with those Duros in the apartment?"

"Yeah?"

"What are the odds they do that a lot? Isn't there an apartment on this side of the city?"

"Probably on the other end of the plaza," Carth replied, pointing to the doors on the northeast end. "Let's go see what we can rustle up."

"'Rustle up,'" Kagi repeated with a snicker, leading the way toward the apartment complex.

"What's so funny?" Carth asked.

The soldier shrugged. "I haven't heard that term in years. Ever, actually. Last time I saw it was in an old joke from Agamar."

"…Funny," the pilot said, muttering something about ungrateful underlings.

"I heard that," Kagi said, then activated the access panel to the apartments.

The door slid open, allowing the two soldiers to enter. Inside, the corridor curved away from them to the left or the right. It was almost identical to the apartment where they were based, except cleaner somehow.

"Left or right?" Carth asked.

"Both?" Kagi ventured.

The pilot shrugged. "Sounds good. I'll go left."

Nodding, Kagi turned to the right and walked down the hallway, passing by a number of civilians and doors, some of them sealed, some not. He glanced into the open doors, bypassed the closed ones, but nothing drew his attention.

Then, as he came around a curve in the corridor and caught sight of Carth again, he saw the Sith trooper standing in the hallway, guarding an open apartment door, right between the two soldiers. It was too perfect.

Catching Carth's eye, Kagi pointed to the Sith trooper with the first two fingers of his left hand and mouthed, "Blast 'im."

In the next instant, the corridor became a hailstorm of blasterfire. Caught between two different fields of fire, the Sith trooper had nowhere to retreat to; he collapsed bonelessly to the floor, his armor smoking.

Moving in a crouch, Kagi rushed to the open apartment door, taking up position outside it. Within a moment, Carth was on the mirroring position on the other side of the door.

"What in blazes is going on out there?" a cultured voice asked. "You, get out there and find those shooters!"

Silent in their positions, both Republic soldiers heard the clamor of the Sith trooper's armored boots crossing the floor of the apartment. Setting his blaster rifle on the ground, Kagi drew his vibroblade and twisted the knife-sized weapon in his right hand.

Then the Sith trooper was in the corridor, among them. Kagi seized him by the left arm, dragged him out of the doorway, and knocked the blaster out of his hand with a hard right punch.

With his left hand holding the trooper's arm and his own vibroblade, Kagi slammed the armored man hard into the wall, dazing him. He quickly passed the vibroblade into his right hand, then drove it into the man's side, between plates of his armor. The man screamed shrilly. Kagi hammered his forearm into the back of the man's helmet, driving his head forward into the complex wall. The screams cut out.

Letting the trooper drop, Kagi pulled his vibroblade from the man's side and retook his position near the door.

"That won't work twice," Carth whispered.

"Nope, gonna have to try something new." With his foot, Kagi sent his blaster rifle skidding across the floor to Carth. "Cover me."

Holstering his blaster pistol, Carth picked up the soldier's rifle. "Kagi, this is nuts," he said. "You're not going to be able to pull this off."

On a whim, the former SpecForces commando searched the utility belt of the Sith trooper, producing a concussion grenade, which he showed to Carth. "Yes, I will."

Carth's expression indicated he didn't think too highly of the plan, but he readied the blaster rifle and sighted down it. Flipping his vibroblade into a reverse grip in his right hand, Kagi primed the concussion grenade in his left hand, let the charge tick down for a few seconds, then threw it into the room.

There was a bang from within the room, and then Kagi was in. He leapt over a low chair, his entire weight slamming into the stunned Sith commander and knocking him to the ground. The soldier dropped his right knee into the officer's chest, then kicked his rifle away with his other hand.

The Sith commander's hands reached up shakily, trying to close them around Kagi's throat. The soldier shrugged them off his shoulders, then clamped his left hand around the commander's throat. He settled his right palm onto the right side of the commander's helmet, then slammed down to his right as hard as he could.

There was a snapping sound, and the fight was over.

Kagi paused for just half a moment, then turned back and waved to Carth. "Drag those two in here!"

Then he looked up at the Aqualish owner of the apartment that the Sith had been harassing. The alien wasn't bothered by the concussion grenade; the natural processes of their bodily functions kept them from being concussed for very long.

"Thank you, human," the alien said in Basic. "The Sith would have killed me. Of that I am certain. I don't know who you are, but it is clear you are no friend of the Sith. Among my people, there is a saying. The enemy of my enemy is my friend."

Kagi smiled humorlessly. "Good outlook."

The Aqualish nodded. "Like you, I hate the Sith. That is why I stole these uniforms for the Hidden Beks."

"Hidden Beks?" Carth asked.

"In the lower city, there are some who do not bow to the conquerors. Swoop gangs like the Hidden Beks are gathering resources to one day strike against the Sith oppressors. If you wish to strike another blow against the Sith, you would be wise to journey to the Lower City and speak with Gadon Thek, the leader of the Hidden Beks."

"We'll do that," Kagi said. "Mind if we borrow your apartment and these uniforms?"

"You can have the apartment, and the uniforms from the Sith you just killed. I'm going to go find someplace on this world to hide. The Sith know my face now. Once again, thank you."

Then the Aqualish was gone, and the apartment door closed behind him. Kagi turned to Carth, and gestured at the three dead Sith. "At least we've got the beauty of choice."

* * *

**A/N:** Nothing much to say about that one. From now on, at the suggestion of bradw316, I'm going to list all the musical selections I thought would fit for the chapter. For this one, there really aren't any, but if you must know, I listened to "Under Her Control" from the FF8 soundtrack for some parts of this. I'm not really in possession of a theme that fits Taris. 

Until next time, my loyal underli- er, reviewers. XD


	4. Lower City Blues

**A/N:** Nothing much to say about this one, except I made one Pirates of the Caribbean reference, catch it if you can. Reccommended reading for this chapter is "The Spy" from the FF8 OST for the Lower City, and "Underneath the Rotting Pizza" from FF7 for the Undercity.

* * *

The elevator descended down into the dark, carrying another pair of Sith troopers for patrol into the Lower City. Or at least, that's what the Sith guard who had been at the elevator thought.

"I can't see a thing in this helmet," Kagi remarked, tapping the faceplate with his knuckles.

"Yeah, the helmets alone are a good reason for someone to come over to our side," Carth replied. "So what's the plan?"

"We get down here, we talk to these Hidden Beks, and find out what they know. Simple."

"No plan ever survives initial contact with the enemy," Carth said as the elevator ground to a halt. The elevator shook violently as it stopped, almost knocking the soldiers off their feet.

"Yeah, well, we improvise," Kagi replied, swaying in place to remain upright.

The door slid open, out onto a grungy street covered with trash and collecting pools of some sort of fetid liquid that neither Republic soldier wanted to know the make or origin of. A rancid smell, like rotting garbage dipped in starship fuel and then left out in the sun for a few days, assaulted their noses, even through the air filters in the helmet.

"For the record," Kagi added, "we're not staying down here long. And if we have to go any lower, I'm going to get violent."

"Me, too," Carth agreed.

Stepping out of the elevator, the two soldiers made their way toward the intersection a few meters in front of them. As they neared, the sounds of arguing and shouting in alien languages grew louder. Carth didn't understand most of it, but Kagi could make out every word.

"Beks are nothing but bantha fodder!" called out an alien that was running past the intersection from their right side. "The Vulkars are strongest!"

"We'll teach you who's strongest!" a Rodian voice replied.

That was apparently all the banter that either side was interested in, as fighting started immediately afterward. As the two soldiers watched, the 'Vulkar' alien stabbed the Rodian with a stun stick, who went down hard. That stun stick was apparently modified to have more lethal effects than not. Kagi and Carth watched the 'Vulkar' alien systemically take out all three of the 'Bek' combatants with the modified stun stick.

"Well, that ended well," Kagi commented off-hand.

"Yeah."

Suddenly, the 'Vulkar' aliens turned around, spotting the two Republic soldiers in Sith uniforms. "Sith aren't welcome here!" the leader called out, then lunged at Kagi, the stun stick sparking.

The SpecForces commando reacted instantly, slapping the alien's hand away with his left hand. As the momentum of the alien carried him past Kagi's right side, the soldier stepped behind him, levering his blaster rifle around and up under the chin of the alien. A little pressure, a hard squeeze, and the alien's neck snapped.

The other two aliens went straight for Carth. Calmly standing his ground, the pilot lined his blaster pistol up with one alien, then drew a second pistol in his other hand and aimed for the other alien. The two pistols rang out at the same time, sending the aliens crashing to the ground, smoking holes blasted into their chests.

After checking the bodies, Carth looked at the two different directions they could go. "So, which way?"

The soldier gestured to the aliens they had dispatched. "Well, these guys came from _that_ way," he said, pointing to the right. He then pointed to the left. "So I say we go this way."

"Sounds good."

With that, the two marched on, following a gentle curve along the 'street.' To their left, they found a sealed door, with a Rodian standing guard in front of it. Kagi walked up to the Rodian.

"Hold on," the buglike alien said in Basic. "The Sith commanders have said I can't let any of you troopers into the cantina while you're on duty."

"Cantina," Carth said. "Not what we're looking for."

Nodding, Kagi turned away from the Rodian and continued down the street. Just a short way down, within sight of the cantina, was another door, with another guard standing outside. This guard was a human female, dark-skinned, and did nothing to conceal the vibroblade she carried.

"Sorry, but your kind aren't welcome in here," she said as the pair approached. "The Hidden Beks don't care much for you Sith."

"We're not Sith," Kagi answered, reaching up and removing his helmet. "We're Republic soldiers."

"Oh, Republics are you?" the guard retorted, scoffing. "That doesn't make you any better off to us. Go on, get out of here!"

"We need Gadon's help," he said. "We were told to see him."

"A lot of people want to go see Gadon," she replied. "But the days of the Hidden Beks' open door policy are gone. Between the Sith conquest and the gang war with the Black Vulkars, Gadon has more enemies than he used to. We're being careful about who we let in now, and that certainly doesn't apply to letting in a couple of Republics like yourselves."

"Think about it," Carth said, taking his helmet off too. "We're Republic soldiers. We're at _war_ with the Sith. Don't you think we could help you out against your enemies?"

The guard considered that, then nodded slowly. "We do need all the help we can get, and we know you Republics got no love for the Sith. Besides, it's not like you can do anything to harm Gadon in the heart of his own base. Not with Zaerdra watching his back."

"So you'll let us in?" Kagi asked.

Reaching back her free hand, the guard keyed open the entryway. "Go in and speak to Gadon if you want. Just remember to be on your best behavior. The Hidden Beks are watching you…"

Nodding, holding his helmet under his right arm with his blaster rifle slung over his shoulder, Kagi led Carth into the base. As they entered the inner door, the occupants of the base turned to stare at them, but made no openly-hostile moves. Kagi figured that was because their weapons were put away, and they weren't wearing helmets.

In the back of the room, Kagi saw a man sitting behind a makeshift desk consisting of a piece of durasteel laid across two crates, and a Twi'lek standing next to him. The soldier gestured to him, then approached.

"Hold it right there, Sith scum," the Twi'lek female called out in Basic. "What is your business with Gadon?"

"Calm down, Zaerdra," the dark-skinned man replied, obviously Gadon. "Nobody's going to try anything here in the middle of our own base. It'd be a suicide mission."

"You're too trusting, Gadon," Zaerdra replied. "These are _Sith_, for Hutt's sake."

"Do you want us to start attacking strangers on sight, Zaerdra?" Gadon snapped. "I will never let it come to that. Now step aside and let them pass."

"As you wish," she muttered, then turned to the Republic soldiers, venom lacing her voice. "You can speak to Gadon if you want, but I've got my eye on you. You try _anything_ and you'll be vaporized before you can say 'Revan's black bones.'"

Raising an eyebrow, Kagi stepped up to the desk, on the other side of which Gadon sat, smiling lightly. It was then that Kagi noticed that Gadon's eyes were not a natural color, as though he had mechanical replacements for his eyes. He decided not to question that.

"You'll have to forgive Zaerdra," Gadon said. "Ever since Brejik and the Vulkars began this war against us, she's been a little overzealous in her security duties. The problems with the Sith haven't helped things. Zaerdra seems to forget that I know how to look after myself. So, what can I help you with?"

"I notice you said problems with _the_ Sith," Carth said, "not _you_ Sith. How do you know we're not with the Sith?"

Gadon smiled humorlessly. "Don't go to think me stupid now, young fellow. Our lookouts wouldn't let any Sith into the base. Besides, if you _were_ Sith, you'd be beating down our doors with an army, not just two soldiers."

"Observant," Kagi praised. "Just what we need. Do you know anything about the Republic escape pods that crashed into the Undercity?"

"Yes, yes, I do," Gadon said. "But before we get into that, where are my manners? Pull up a cargo crate and sit down."

The two Republic soldiers shrugged, then moved off to retrieve some empty cargo containers, planting them on the floor in front of Gadon's desk before sitting down on them.

"Now, about those escape pods," Gadon said. "I heard the Sith have been asking around the Upper City about them as well, but we've already gone over why you're not Sith. Me, I'd just as soon assume that you're Republics."

"_Very_ observant," Carth commented.

"It's not like telling you what I know would do any harm to me or my gang," Gadon continued. "It might cause problems for the Vulkars, though, and believe me, I've got no problems with that. The Vulkars stripped those pods clean within hours after they landed. It's too bad we didn't get there first, considering what my spies reported the Vulkars found."

"Commander Shan," Carth said.

The gang leader nodded. "Female Republic officer, Bastila Shan, as is reported to me. We Beks don't believe in intergalactic slavery, but the Vulkars aren't so picky. They took her prisoner."

A chill ran up Kagi's spine as he listened to Gadon's information. "What will they do with her?"

"Under normal circumstances, the Vulkars would sell a captured slave for a nice profit to Davik or an off-world slaver," Gadon replied. "But a Republic officer is no ordinary find."

Carth leaned in close to Kagi, lowering his voice so no one else would hear. "They still think Commander Shan is just an officer," he whispered. "This could work to our advantage. She may even figure a way to escape from the Vulkar base on her own."

Obviously, Carth had not spoken as quietly as he'd intended. "She's too valuable to leave with the scum at the Vulkar base," Gadon said, letting the first part of his statement slide, for now. "Brejik's probably got your Republic friend hidden away somewhere until the big swoop race. You'll never find her."

Kagi raised an eyebrow. "Swoop race?"

"Your commander has become a pawn in Brejik's ploy to take over the Lower City," Gadon replied, shrugging helplessly. "He's offered her up as Vulkar's share of the prize in the annual swoop gang race."

A stab of anger at these Vulkars shot through Kagi at that comment, and the SpecForces commando had no idea why.

"By putting up such a valuable prize," Gadon continued, "Brejik hopes to win the loyalty of some of the smaller gangs. Their numbers will finally allow him to destroy me and my followers."

"So how do you propose we go about rescuing Commander Shan anyway?" Carth asked. "We can't fight _all_ the gangs."

_I don't know, it might be fun…_ Kagi mused, left eyebrow raised.

"The only hope you have of rescuing your commander is to win the big season opener of the swoop race," Gadon replied.

"Can you help us with that, Gadon?" Kagi asked.

"I _might_ be able to help you with this," the gang leader said, scratching his chin thoughtfully, "if you'd be willing to help us. We both have something to gain here, and much to lose."

"Name your terms, Mister Thek," the soldier said without hesitation.

"The swoop race is for the lower city gangs only. I could sponsor you as a rider for the Hidden Beks this year. If you win, you win your commander's freedom. But first you have to do something for me. My mechanics have developed an accelerator for a swoop engine. A bike with the accelerator installed can beat any other swoop out there."

"The Vulkars stole it, didn't they?" Kagi asked.

Gadon nodded. "They plan to use it to guarantee victory in this year's swoop race. I need you to break into their base and steal it back."

"Done and done," the soldier said. "Details?"

"Getting into their base won't be easy; the front doors are locked tight. But I know someone who might be able to get you in the back way. Mission Vao."

"Mission?" Zaerdra sneered. "Gadon, you can't be serious. She's just a kid! How is she supposed to help them with this?"

"Mission's explored every step of every back alley in the Lower City," Gadon replied irritably. "Plus, she knows the Undercity sewers better than anyone. If anyone can get inside the Vulkar base, it's her."

"Where do I find her?" Kagi intervened, stepping in before violence occurred.

Gadon took a moment to compose himself, then turned back to his guests. "She and her Wookie friend Zaalbar are always looking to stir up a little excitement. They like to go exploring in the Undercity, despite the dangers. Your best bet is to look for her in the Undercity, but you'll need some way past the Sith guard at the elevator."

Kagi rapped his knuckles against the appropriated Sith armor he wore. "We've got it covered."

Gadon shook his head. "A simple disguise might have worked on the Upper City guard, but down here the security is much tougher. You'll need the proper papers to get past them." Just as the soldier looked as though he was about to swear a blue streak, Gadon lifted his hand placatingly. "_Luckily_, my gang ambushed one of the Sith patrols headed down to the Undercity. They never made it, and their security papers fell into my hands. Since we're working together now, I suppose I could give them to you in exchange for your uniforms. With the papers, you won't need a disguise anyway."

"Consider it done," Kagi said, already stripping off pieces of the stolen armor. Carth did likewise, and within a few moments, two complete suits of armor were packed neatly into the cargo crates they had been sitting on.

"Good choice," Gadon said, handing the soldier a folded envelope with the Sith Empire seal upon it. "Thanks for the uniforms. Now, is there anything else I can do for you?"

"No, I don't think so," Kagi said, putting the envelope inside his combat jacket. "We'll be back when we've got that engine for you."

"I suggest you hurry," the gang leader replied. "The race is coming up, and we want you to have time to practice first."

Nodding, the two Republic soldiers turned and left the gang's base. Outside, they paused, wondering which direction the elevator would be. "Any idea?" Carth asked.

The soldier shook his head, then turned to the guard standing outside the door. "'Scuse me, would you happen to know which way to the Undercity elevator?"

"Yeah, just follow this road around until you get to the dead end," the guard replied, pointing further down the road past the Beks' base.

"Thanks," Kagi said, then turned and walked in the given direction.

As they turned a corner, they saw a pair of Vulkar thugs conversing with a human. They approached slowly, not wanting to get drawn into a fight.

"…with your payments," the human said, not intimidated by them at all. "What, do you think just because you're in some _gang_ that you don't have to give Davik his cut?"

"I don't see Davik doing anything for his share," one of the aliens snapped back. "We do all the work. Davik claims he's part of the exchange, so let him prove it."

"Yeah, let's see the big crime lord come and get his money from the Vulkars," the other said.

"Ah, so you want to play this the hard way, eh?" the human asked calmly, chuckling. "If you insist."

He turned to his right, pursed his lips together, and whistled shrilly.

From behind a pillar stepped a man who had the look of a hardened soldier about him. Kagi could tell right away he was a Mandalorian; he recognized the man's clan tattoo on his left arm, as well as the heavy armored boots that he wore. Too, the heavy repeating blaster cannon he cradled in his hands was a living example of the Mandalorian motto, "The bigger the gun, the better."

"Oh, he-hey, Canderous…" the alien who had spoken first said, his voice trembling. "We didn't know you was working for Davik now."

"Yeah, we were just goofin' around here," the other said. "We don't want no trouble with a Mandalorian." That alien fished a number of credits out of his pocket, which he handed to the human. "Here's Davik's cut!"

"I knew you boys would see reason," the human replied, counting them carefully. "Now get out of here."

"Too bad," the Mandalorian said. "I was looking forward to cracking some heads."

"Maybe next time, Canderous," the human replied. "I better get this over to Davik. I'll call you if anyone else gets behind on their payments."

The Mandalorian muttered something in his own language, doubtless obscene, as the other human walked away.

Kagi shrugged toward Carth, glad they didn't need to get caught up in that little confrontation. As they moved past the Mandalorian, Kagi nodded tensely at him. The Mandalorian returned it.

Down the road a ways, with the elevator now in sight, they passed a wrecked swoop bike with a Twi'lek corpse near it. The corpse was wearing the colors that they were coming to recognize as belonging to the Vulkars. They ignored it.

As they neared the door, the Sith trooper held up his hand. "Hold on there, civilian," he said. "Only those with official Sith business are allowed into the Undercity."

Shifting his blaster rifle into his left hand, Kagi reached into his jacket and produced the papers that Gadon had given him. "No need to worry yourself, trooper," he said confidently. "I've got my clearance right here."

"Let me see that," the trooper said suspiciously, snatching the papers from his hand. He shuffled through them for a few moments. "Hmm… Yeah, these look to be in order." He handed them back. "Okay, you can go down if you want. Can't say I envy you, though. The Undercity is crawling with mutants. Rakghouls, they call 'em. If you see anything moving down there, shoot first and ask questions later."

Kagi nodded, returning the papers to his jacket. "Thanks for the tip, trooper."

---

The smell only got worse as the elevator descended down into the darkness, and this time, they didn't have the benefit of the Sith armor and its filtration devices.

"…bantha in mating season," Kagi finished off a crude comment as the doors slid open, into the depths of the Undercity.

The two soldiers stepped out of the elevator, looking around the Spartan complex. Most of the dwellings were tent-like structures, likely built with the refuse that fell from above. A few salvaged glowlamps provided meager lighting for the encampment.

"You there!" a greasy, dirty, nattily-clothed man called out as he and a fellow approached them. "Up-worlder! Anyone using this elevator has to pay the toll!"

"Yeah, this is _our_ elevator," the other man said. "If you use it, you've gotta give us something."

"I don't believe this planet," Carth said, a hint of humor in his voice. "Even the beggars are trying to shake us down."

"Five credits!" the first man crowed. "That's what it costs to use our elevator. Five credits!"

"I can't believe I'm going along with this," Kagi muttered, reaching into his pocket for a five-credit chip, which he flipped to the beggar. "There, now go on. Get out of here."

"Go on, you two, get out of here!" a female voice called.

The two Republic soldiers turned to their right to see a young woman running up, her own state of hygiene no different than that of the beggars. Her expression was irritable as she ran up to shoo the beggars off, then she sighed, put on a more optimistic expression, and turned to the newcomers.

"I'm sorry about that," she said. "Those two beggars give everyone in the village a bad name. We aren't all like that, you know. Most of us are good people."

"I'm sure you are, miss," Carth replied, his expression and tone of voice indicating he didn't believe a word she said. "It's just too bad your little welcome committee is there to give people a bad first impression."

Kagi glanced over at the pilot, an expression that said cool down, then turned back to the girl. "Name's Vayun, Kagi Vayun. Captain Angst over there is Carth Onasi."

"My name is Shaleena," the girl replied, smiling pleasantly. "You're from the upworld, aren't you? I've…never seen it. I was born down here in the Undercity. Is it as nice as they say it is?"

The SpecForces commando shrugged. "It's nothing special."

"Not to you, I suppose," Shaleena said sadly. "But you're probably used to its beauty. Gendar, the leader of our village, tells me I should spend more time trying to improve things down here and less time dreaming about something I can never have. Maybe he's right."

"Can I ask you a few questions?" Kagi asked.

"You'd probably get more information from Gendar, but I'll tell you whatever I can."

"Do you know anything about the escape pods that crashed down here?"

She shook her head, then offered up a 'what-can-you-do' smile. "Sorry, I don't know anything about that. Maybe Gendar can help you?"

"Where can I find him?"

"He'll be somewhere in the village, doing what he can to make the lives of the villagers better. I can't really say."

Kagi nodded. "Thanks. I'll be on my way now."

She nodded in return, smiling pleasantly. "If you ever want to talk, just come back to see me. I don't get to talk to upworlders often."

As she turned and walked away, Carth fell into step beside Kagi. "Do we need to talk to their village leader?" he asked. "We're down here to find this Mission Vao and get into the Vulkar base; we already know Bastila won't be in any of the escape pods."

Kagi nodded. "That's a good point. We'll just roll on out of here then." The soldier looked around the immediate vicinity, then pointed straight across the compound. "That looks like a gate out over there. Let's go."

Drawing his blaster pistols, Carth nodded and followed in the soldier's wake. As they moved through the camp, villagers cleared them a wide berth, and stared enviously at their relatively-clean clothes and good hygiene.

As they reached the gate, some kind of commotion became obvious.

"Hurry, Hendar, hurry!" a woman pleaded from their side of the gate. "I can hear it coming!"

"He'll never make it," answered a man standing next to the gate control. His tone was helpless. "He's doomed. I told him he was a fool to leave the village."

"He _will_ make it," the woman hissed, then raised her voice and shouted through the gate, "Run, Hendar, run!"

Through the grates, Kagi could see a man running toward them, as fast as he possibly could. And following the man was some kind of creature, with pale grey skin that stood out against the darkness. He couldn't make out any other features.

"Open the gate!" the man cried as he ran. "There isn't much time!"

"I can't!" the gate guard replied. "The rakghouls are too close!"

"The mutants will kill him if you don't open the gate!" the woman pleaded.

"And if I open the gate they'll kill us all!" the guard replied.

Kagi chose this time to stride forward, charging his blaster rifle. "Open that gate!" he ordered, using his drill sergeant voice. "I'll deal with these rakghouls."

"You would risk your life for a stranger?" the guard said, astonished. "You are brave, up-worlder."

"Less talk, more mutant death," Kagi said. "Open that gate!"

The guard nodded, triggering the lever to slide the gate into the ground. The two Republic soldiers charged out, their blasters spitting hot light. Kagi could get a good look at the creature now; it was humanoid in form, with long arms that dangled to the ground, tipped with broken claws. It moved in a hunched over half-run, and its powerful leg muscles looked like they could send it leaping a half dozen meters. The monster had no visible eyes, nose or ears, but it did have a huge mouth studded with broken, bacterially-infected fangs.

The creature leapt at the man they were trying to save, but a strong bash to the side of its head from the stock of Kagi's blaster rifle disabused it of the notion. The creature flailed to the ground, screeching in pain, as it struggled to right itself.

Kagi and Carth stepped right up to it, taking care to stay out of the range of its teeth or claws, and opened fire into its side. The stink of burning, rotten flesh filled the air, even overwhelming the ozone smell of the blasters discharging.

The monster twitched once, and did not move again.

"Now will you open the gate?" the man cried to the gate guard.

Without a word, the guard dropped the gate, and the three of them returned to the inside of the village.

"I can't thank you enough for saving me, up-worlder," Hendar said. "If I had anything but the rags on my back, they would be yours. But we have nothing."

"I still have you, Hendar," the woman said. "That's all I need."

The two ran back toward the center of the village. Kagi watched them a moment, and nodded. Then he turned back around.

"Thank you for saving Hendar," the gate guard said. "You are braver than I, up-worlder. Maybe we Outcasts have lived too long in selfish fear. Perhaps we can learn a lesson from your brave actions. But I have rambled on enough. Is there anything you need, up-worlder?"

Kagi jerked his left thumb at the gates. "I kinda do need to get out."

"Oh, absolutely," the guard said, triggering the gates open. "Goodbye, up-worlder."

Nodding, the two Republic soldiers exited the village, looking around cautiously. It was like an entirely different world out there. Carth pointed to their right.

"Look, Sith patrol."

"Screw 'em," Kagi replied. "Not our problem." He pointed right ahead of them, past a pile of rubble, to the corner of what looked like a drainage pipe. "I think we could get in over there, no problem."

Carth nodded, and turned to follow. They had only gone a few steps when they heard a voice call out from behind them.

"Please, you have to help me! Nobody else is going to help me! Even the Beks won't help me!"

The two soldiers turned to see a blue-skinned young Twi'lek girl running up to them, hysteria on her features. Her spacer's clothes were stained with sweat, as if she'd just run a marathon.

"But I can't just leave him there!" she continued, running up to them. "He's my friend! You'll help me, won't you?"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Kagi said, holding his hands up. "Calm down there, little missy. You wouldn't happen to be Mission Vao, would you?"

She narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously. "What if I am?"

"Gadon Thek said you could help me," the soldier replied calmly.

"Gadon?" she wheezed, trying to catch her breath. "What? I… I don't know what you're talking about. Please, Zaalbar's in trouble. He needs help or they're going to sell him into slavery!"

"Who's going to sell him to slavery?" Kagi asked, confusion knitting his brow. "What happened?"

"Me and Zaalbar were just wandering around here in the Undercity," she replied, gulping in deep breaths. "You know, looking for stuff we can find, kind of exploring. We do it all the time."

"I guess with a Wookie at your side, you figure you can handle the odd rakghoul attack," Carth said, looking back at the monster they had killed.

The Twi'lek girl nodded at the pilot. "Only this time, they were waiting for us," she explained. "Gamorrean slave hunters. We didn't even have a chance to run. Big Z threw himself at him, and roared at me to run. I took off. I figured Zaalbar would be right behind me. But there were too many of them, he couldn't get away. They're going to sell him to a slaver, I just know it!"

"Where'd they take him?" Kagi asked, checking the charge in his blaster rifle. Poor thing hadn't gotten a rest since he'd woken up.

"I don't know for sure, but they like to hang out in the sewers," she replied. "I guess the stink reminds 'em of home or something."

"How about we help each other out? We'll help you find Zaalbar, you get us into the Black Vulkar base."

"Deal," she said. "As soon as we find Big Z, I'll show you the back entrance to the Vulkar base. Now let's go find him before they sell him to slavers, or worse!"

"Let's mosey," Kagi said, turning and resuming the original course beyond the pile of rubble. Once they were past it, the soldier spotted a gradient leading down to a sewer grate. He turned and smirked at Carth. "Told you."

The two soldiers wrestled the grate free of the opening, then Kagi lead the way inside…


	5. A Crawl in the Muck

**A/N:** More reccommended listening: "Anxiety" from FFX-2 for the sewers, "Under Bevelle" from FFX-2 for the rancor encounter.

* * *

"It's official, Carth," Kagi said miserably. "We are never going to get rid of this smell. We're going to need new blasters, new clothes, new _everything_."

"A vacation would be nice, while we're at it," the pilot said.

"Seconded."

The only saving grace about the sewers was that there was a dedicated walkway beneath which the sludge and waste of the three levels of Taris flowed. The air scrubbers used to remove noxious bacteria that Kagi saw everywhere were functional, or at least he hoped they were.

Suddenly, Kagi held out his hands to both sides, stopping Carth and Mission. He was staring pointedly at the ground Carth was about to walk on. "Carth, do not move an inch," he said. "Mission, stay where you are."

"What is it Ka- oh Sithspit!" Carth exclaimed, looking down beneath his boot, underneath which was a frag mine.

"Don't move!" the SpecForces commando hissed. Kneeling down near the mine, Kagi reached into his utility pouch and extracted a pack of tools. One of them, a mirror-like strip of metal with an adhesive on one side, he stuck to the bottom of Carth's boot.

As the pilot busied himself by praying to every god he had ever heard about, Kagi took a thin-nosed interface tool and inserted it carefully into a seam on the mine's side. There was a faint popping sound, and he used the tool to push open an access panel on the side of the mine. He then inserted the tool into the mine, working silently and carefully.

A moment later, Kagi sealed the access panel, removed the strip of material from Carth's boot, then reached down and picked the mine up off the ground. "Simple," he said, returning all the tools and the mine to his utility pouch.

"Thanks, Kagi," Carth said, patting the soldier's shoulder. "I owe you one."

Nodding, the soldier walked forward, triggering a hidden infrared sensor that sprung open the door into the next section of the sewers. As soon as the door was cleared, he saw them. Rancid, grey-skinned monsters. Four of them, waiting in the next room.

"Rakghouls," Mission hissed, drawing her blaster pistol.

"Grenades," Kagi said, handing a frag grenade to both of his comrades. He readied and primed his own grenade, then drew his arm back. "Throw."

There was the swishing of their clothing as the three threw their grenades, then a trio of metallic clanks as the grenades landed on the deck. A scant number of seconds later, three explosions went off in such rapid succession that the sound was like that of a single explosion.

Three shrieks greeted the explosion, and a moment later a rakghoul head went sailing past the three heroes. Kagi grimaced at the specter, leveled his blaster rifle, and advanced into the room. It was eerily silent.

Ahead of him, just inside the room, a rakghoul corpse laid on its side, a hole blown into its chest, shrapnel peppering the edges of the wound. The commando nudged it with his boot, and when it didn't react, he moved on. The next rakghoul he came to was still alive; half of its face was blasted off by the grenades and it was bleeding some thick, clear-green liquid, but still alive. A quick shot from his blaster rifle put it down.

Three down, one more to go. Kagi found the last rakghoul crammed up in a corner, not visibly wounded. It was, however, reeling. It had probably been stunned by the blast. Kagi waved Carth over, and the two soldiers leveled their weapons at the beast, and fired a single volley.

Near the now-dead rakghoul was a skeletal corpse, chewed and gnawed by the beasts over who-knows-how-long a period of time. After a quick check of it for credits and a medpac, Kagi triggered open the door near it, proceeding cautiously along the walkway.

Ahead of them, he could hear the grunting and snorting of a Gamorrean. The soldier ran up to the corner and crouched there, peeking around to see a single of the pig-faced aliens walking around on the catwalk. Kagi flicked a switch on his blaster rifle, activating a red laser sight, which he then placed over the back of the pig's head.

His rifle bucked once. The Gamorrean let out a choked-off squeal, then collapsed on the walkway.

"Too easy," he remarked.

Standing up, he motioned his comrades forward, and stalked slowly down the catwalk. Around the curve, a series of closed doors led left, right, and forward further down the hall. With the first two fingers of his left hand, Kagi gestured to the rightmost door.

Mission put her hand on the soldier's shoulder, then crept forward toward the door, pressing her head gently up against it. The two soldiers were astonished by the silence of her movement; either of them could've gotten to that door, but they'd have made a lot of noise in the progress.

After a moment, the young Twi'lek snuck back toward the soldiers. "There's a lot of Gamorreans on the other side of that door," she whispered. "I count at least four, maybe more."

"Okay," Kagi said, giving his mind a moment to concoct a plan. "Piggies are big and strong, but not particularly fast or smart. We frag 'em. We frag 'em like it's going out of style. Mission, you throw in two concussion grenades, Carth and I will throw in frags. Move."

Carth and Kagi moved to take up positions on either side of the door, readying grenades and blasters. Mission stood in front of the door, a concussion grenade in either hand. The Twi'lek nodded at Kagi. He nodded back, then looked at Carth. The pilot laid one blaster pistol on the ground, readied a grenade, then nodded to the commando.

Kagi triggered the door.

Gamorreans squealed in surprise as four cylinders sailed through the air. A series of blasts filled the air, followed by the death-squeals of two of the pigs. Two more were swaying in place, stunned by the concussion grenades. A fifth was lying on the floor, clutching a bleeding wound in its side. The last Gamorrean was unharmed, coming right at Kagi, his vibroaxe singing as it sliced through the air.

The commando flung himself backwards, the axe buzzing through the space he had once occupied. As he brought his rifle down on the pole of the vibroaxe, pushing it farther toward the ground, Mission and Carth rushed into the room, their blasters spitting fire at the other three Gamorreans.

The Gamorrean leader squealed like a stuck pig, trying unsuccessfully to free his vibroaxe from Kagi's rifle. With his right hand, Kagi reached down to draw his trusty vibroblade, flipping it to hold in a reverse grip, then he stabbed over his left shoulder.

And then the Gamorrean was a stuck pig.

The vibroaxe clattered to the ground as the alien stumbled back, green blood flowing from the wound in its throat, the wound that the vibroblade was still buried in. Kagi turned toward the slowly-dying alien, leveling his blaster rifle. Without preamble, he fired a single shot into the Gamorrean's forehead, finishing it.

The heroes took a moment to rest, then Mission moved toward the closed door on the left side of the room. "Hmm, look at this," she said, pointing to the door. "This is one of those old style manual locks. No computer codes or nothing. The sewers are the only place you'll see one of these on Taris."

"Can you open it?" Kagi asked, pulling his vibroblade from the Gamorrean's throat. He grimaced at the green blood that dripped off it, flicking as much off as he could, gingerly wiping the rest off on the Gamorrean's clothing. Satisfied that he had gotten it as clean as he could, he sheathed it. "That's my favorite vibroblade."

"Oh definitely," she replied. "You can't use standard spikes on it, but I worked up a bypass to get around them."

The young girl pulled a tool from her belt and set to work picking the lock. After a few moments, the door slid open. From across the room, a dark-colored mass of fur approached the group.

"You're a sight for sore eyes, Mission," it grumbled in Shryiiwook, the native language of the Wookies.

"I'm glad to see you too, Big Z!" she said, throwing herself against the mass of fur. "You didn't think I'd forget about you? Mission and Zaalbar, together forever!"

Kagi nodded slowly; this was obviously Zaalbar, the Wookie they had come to save. Laying his rifle against his shoulder, the soldier walked up to the pair.

"Who is this?" the Wookie asked, pointing to Kagi, and then Carth.

"These are my new friends, Big Z," she answered. "Without them, I couldn't have gotten you out."

Kagi stepped forward, shifting his blaster rifle to his left hand, extending his other to the Wookie. "Name's Kagi Vayun, Zaalbar," he said in passable Shryiiwook. "Pleasure."

The Wookie, obviously familiar with human greeting customs, met Kagi's handshake with a strong grip. "You know the language of my people," Zaalbar rumbled. "That is rare among your species. I am impressed. You have saved me from a lifetime of servitude and slavery. There is only one way I can ever repay such an act: I will swear a life debt to you."

Kagi nodded solemnly, releasing the Wookie's furred hand. He was well versed with the Wookie culture, and he knew how serious a life debt was to the honor-bound Wookie species.

"A life debt?" Mission asked, clearly shocked. "Are you sure about that, Big Z? You'd better think about this."

"I am sure, Mission," Zaalbar replied. "This is an issue of great importance to me. When the Gamorreans captured me, I thought I was doomed to a life of servitude. I have been saved from such a fate, and the only way I can repay that is through a life debt."

"It is a great honor to be sworn a life debt by such a warrior as yourself, Zaalbar," Kagi said in Basic. "I will not betray your trust in me."

The Wookie nodded once. "In the presence of you all, I swear my life debt. Forever will I be by your side, Kagi Vayun. May my vow be as strong as the great wroshyr trees of Kashyyyk."

"I guess this means you're stuck with me, too," Mission said. "Wherever Big Z goes, I go. I almost lost him once, I'm not going to do it again."

"Welcome to the party, Mission. But we've still got work to do, here."

The Twi'lek nodded. "Right. Now that you've helped me save Big Z, I'm going to get you into the Vulkar base. I don't remember exactly how to get there, but I know it was in the northeast sector of the sewers. I just hope the rancor isn't still there."

"Wait a second," Carth interjected. "Did you say _rancor_?"

"Uh huh. There was a rancor that made its nest down here in the sewers. Pretty much ate whatever it could get its claws on."

"Oh this just keeps getting better and better," Kagi said. "First a romp in the sewers, now rancors. Well, we'd better move out. Back the way we came, since we already know that way's clear."

The quartet moved out of the prison area, back to the main catwalk. As they passed the Gamorrean corpses, Zaalbar rummaged among them for a few moments, until he produced his personal bowcaster, a fearsomely-powerful blaster type weapon.

Moving quickly, the group made it back to the sewer entrance, and then opened the door they had previously bypassed. As soon as it opened, Kagi held his hands out to either side.

"Nobody move. Got another mine."

The commando laid his blaster rifle on the ground, then withdrew the tools from his pouch. Kneeling down, he went about the process of disarming and recovering the mine. Sure enough, within a few moments, he slipped the mine into the grenade pouch on his belt, and pocketed the tools again.

Just to their left, a force field shimmered faintly as it blocked off a section of tunnel, glowing blue in the dim light. Across from it was an access terminal.

"Let me handle this," Mission said, stepping up to the terminal and punching in commands. After a moment, she called out, "There!"

Kagi turned to the force field, just in time to watch it flicker and die out. "Good job, Mission," he praised, then raised his blaster rifle. "Let's move."

The group entered the sealed-off tunnel, and Kagi could sense that they were getting marginally closer to the surface. The smell was also getting worse, though they were mostly used to it by now.

There was a single door in front of them, which Kagi triggered open. Beyond was some sort of flow control room, with the walkway circling around a large hole in the ground, into which sewage was flowing from above. That explained the smell.

Inside this room, several Gamorrean slavers were fighting off a small handful of rakghouls. Kagi grimaced, then turned back to his comrades.

"Sneak around to the left. Let's try to avoid getting into a fight."

The others nodded, and followed the commando as he swept along the left side of the catwalk, keeping as close to the railing as he could. As the pigs and monsters continued to fight, the group successfully snuck around, slipping into another door that led out of the flow room.

"Shut that door!" Kagi called, firing on a pair of Gamorreans that were in the same stretch of tunnel as them.

Carth joined the commando in firing, while Zaalbar covered Mission, who busied herself by hacking into the access panel for the door they'd just come through. The first Gamorrean went down, his torso reduced to a charred mass. The soldiers shifted their fire to the second pig-snouted alien as the door slid shut behind them, locking in place. Zaalbar came up to join them, taking careful aim with his bowcaster and firing. The face of the Gamorrean simply exploded, and the dead alien pitched over backwards.

"Nice shooting," Carth remarked.

The party continued down the long corridor, and this time Mission stepped up to the door to listen for activity on the other side. She stood there for a few moments, frowned, stepped back, then placed the other side of her head against the door.

"Anything?"

"Nothing," she replied, then reached out and triggered the door release.

It slid open, letting them out into another flow room. Mission wasn't entirely wrong.

As the first blaster bolt spanged off the wall near Kagi's head, forcing the soldier to swear and duck, they noticed the damaged droid floating around on the other side of the catwalk.

They all opened fire, concentrating on the repulsorlift mechanism beneath the droid. Mission's and Carth's shots barely scratched the armor plating, but the more powerful bolts from Kagi and Zaalbar did significantly more damage, sending the damaged droid careening into the flow of sewage falling from above.

Idly watching the droid sink out of sight, Kagi led the group around the left side of the catwalk, altogether avoiding the mine placed on the right side. He bypassed the first door, heading straight for the second one.

The tap of a button opened the door, and he almost walked right onto another mine. Sighing, the commando pulled out his tools, handed his blaster rifle to Zaalbar, and went to work. "Definitely know we're going the right way," he commented off-hand, standing up and putting mine and tools away.

After taking his weapon back, Kagi continued to advance forward slowly, listening for the signs of any enemies in the area. He heard no grunting or squealing of Gamorreans, and he hadn't yet learned any particular sounds that the rakghouls make, other than the screeches when you hit one of them.

Ahead of them, the corridor took a turn to the right, then angled down slightly. He paused at a series of pipes that ran down either side of the wall, looking down the corridor into the gloom. Far ahead, perhaps ten meters, was another door. There was a dark object lying on the ground near it that didn't appear to be natural.

He turned to face his comrades. "Mission, stay here," he said. "Zaalbar, watch her. Carth, let's go."

The two soldiers moved forward at a trot, their weapons up and ready, scanning the corridor around them for any signs of an ambush. Behind them, they could hear Mission and Zaalbar faintly discussing the Wookie's hygienic habits. Smirking, Kagi put their discussion out of his mind and kept moving.

Eventually, they reached the object, realizing that it was a severed arm, blood pooling out of the stump. It was clutching a datapad.

"Oh, that's lovely," Carth said, his face set in stone.

Kneeling down, Kagi picked up the datapad and read aloud from its surface. "'We have synthesized an odor that resembles the favorite prey of rancors. If we place the bait properly, we can lure the rancor into eating something lethal enough to kill it.' Well, something tells me your trick didn't work as well as you hoped it would."

Sighing, the soldier stuffed the datapad into a pouch on his utility belt, then pulled open a sleeve pocket and withdrew three small vials with some sort of liquid-based timing release, and filled with a yellow-green fluid of some kind. Testingly, Kagi lifted one of the vials to take a whiff of the smell that would attract rancors. Almost immediately, he jerked his head back and the vial away from him, coughing violently.

"Oh, _fierfek_," he muttered, using the Mandalorian word for one of the most displeasing creatures in the known galaxy. "That is _rancid_. I'd take the sewer smell any day."

Standing up, he carefully placed the vials in an empty pouch on his utility belt, then stood up and nudged the arm off the side of the catwalk with his boot. That done, he signaled for Mission and Zaalbar to catch up.

After a moment, the odd pair walked up to them, Mission asking, "What's up?"

"Looks like you were right about the rancor," Carth told her. "We found one unfortunate fellow who had encountered it."

"What's left, you mean," Mission said, grimacing.

"Seems like him and his group had worked up a lure for the rancor," Kagi said, patting the pouch with the three vials. "I doubt that we could lure it long enough for all three of us to sneak past, but a datapad we found did mention getting it to eat something lethal."

"Grenades?" Carth ventured.

"Probably do it, but where would we hide it?" The soldier sighed, turning toward the closed door. "Alright, I'm going to open this door. I'm willing to bet that the rancor's in there, so everyone be quiet."

The other three nodded their assent, and Kagi stuck his blaster rifle forward, into the range of the infrared sensor that governed the doors. They slid open quietly, admitting a wash of air filled with the scent of death and decay. Directly in front of them, a pile of corpses, some still intact, others little more than skeletal fragments, rotted in the putrid air of the chamber.

Mission turned and ran up the corridor, retching violently over the side of the catwalk. Zaalbar moaned quietly, suddenly thankful that the Gamorreans hadn't fed him. It meant he didn't have anything to reintroduce to the world at large. Carth's face blanched white; he turned aside, putting his hands over his eyes and taking several deep breaths. Kagi gagged, then leaned over and put his head between his knees, pinching the bridge of his nose with the index finger and thumb of his left hand.

_That…is without doubt the worst smell I've ever had the misfortune of encountering._

After a few moments, the adventurers recovered themselves. Kagi set his blaster rifle on the ground, then reached into his utility belt, passing a frag grenade into his left hand, and one of the vials of rancor bait into his right. He nodded his head toward the corpse pile.

"I'll drop the bait and the grenade in there. That way even if the grenade doesn't do it, it may choke on some of the bones."

"Be careful," Carth said, sighting his blasters on the rancor, just to be safe.

Nodding, the commando advanced out into the chamber, approaching the pile of corpses. On the far end of the chamber, the rancor was eating something, the guttural growls and slurping sounds of the huge beast enough to make his stomach turn.

Within a handful of steps, he had reached the corpse pile. Ever so carefully, he leaned over them, not trusting his balance to be able to step over them without making noise. Carefully, he inserted the grenade into the eye socket of a large Gamorrean skull, checking to make sure that the moisture-sensitive adhesive he had applied to the safety device was in place. Now certain that the grenade would explode a few seconds after being swallowed, he carefully shook the rancor bait to begin the scent release process, then placed it into the nostril socket of the skull.

Now it was only a matter of time. Not wishing to be anywhere near the pile when the rancor came after the smell, Kagi turned and began to run back toward his comrades.

That was about the time when his boot came down on a ribcage, a series of sharp snapping sounds echoing through the room.

A loud screech rebounded from the walls of the chamber, deafening the adventurers. Kagi's head snapped up, looking in the direction of the sound. His eyes met those of the rancor as the snarling, drooling beast turned fully around, and began stomping in his direction.

"RUN!" Carth shouted from the adjoining tunnel.

Without waiting for a second piece of advice, the commando turned and ran for the other door, opposite the one he had come through. The rancor came stomping after him, plowing right through the pile of corpses, scattering dead beings, the grenade, and the bait in all directions.

Kagi didn't bother to watch where the grenade went; he ran straight through the IR sensor range of the doors, but the failed to open. He swore violently; the sensor must have been damaged somehow.

The commando turned, finding the rancor's right hand, with clawed fingers as long as he was tall, reaching out for him. Suddenly, from somewhere beneath them, the grenade exploded, rocking the area, and causing the rancor to roar out, searching its surroundings for the source of the blast.

Taking advantage of the monster's momentary distraction, Kagi lunged forward, sliding between the rancor's massive legs. Coming up in a crouch behind the beast, Kagi's right hand instinctively drew his vibroblade. Right at the point he was about to strike at it, he paused, turning his attention from the monster to the vibroblade, and back again.

He shook his head, sheathed the vibroblade, then turned and ran.

The beast was soon on him again though, not having been surprised by the grenade for long. Its long, limber arm reached out, fingers snapping the commando up like a blade of grass. The monster's hand clamped tightly around him, drawing him up toward its gaping, drooling maw.

From down below, a ruckus of blaster fire sparked up as Mission, Zaalbar, and Carth opened fire on it. Their blaster and bowcaster shots peppered the beast's side, but did no real damage to it.

But the incessant fire irritated it. The rancor stopped, turning its massive head toward the trio and roaring menacingly. Something clicked in Kagi's mind. He squirmed within the rancor's grasp, trying to get into his utility belt.

His struggling drew the rancor's attention. The monster roared again, blasting Kagi with its rancid breath. Fighting against the blackness swimming around the edges of his vision, his fingers brushed the rounded surface of a grenade. He called out to his comrades, "Shoot it again!"

They did as ordered, another hailstorm of fire slamming into the beast's flank as Kagi freed his arms, passing something to his right hand before drawing it back. As expected, the rancor turned its monstrous head toward the trio and roared. But this time, as it did so, Kagi's arm shot forward, releasing the object he held in it.

The rancor suddenly stopped roaring, clamping its jaws shut, and that proved to be its doom. Half a second later, the grenade exploded in the back of its throat, the concussive shockwaves liquefying what little brain the monster possessed, and blowing a hole in its back, through which foul-smelling tissue was expelled.

The beast let out one roar, sounding more like a sickened gurgle, before it toppled over, the weight of its impact causing the sewers to shudder.

"Kagi!" Mission shrieked, racing forward to where the arm of the monster had fallen. Carth and Zaalbar approached as well, keeping their weapons trained on the mass of monster.

They found the commando struggling to wiggle his way out of the clenched fingers of the dead beast, his own hands planted against its fingers and pushing as hard as he could. The Republic pilot holstered his pistols, running up to Kagi's side and getting a grip beneath his left arm. Zaalbar likewise grabbed the man by his right arm, and together, the three of them managed to get him free of the dead beast's grasp.

"Well, _that_ was fun," the commando remarked, grimacing at the ichor caked to his pants. "_Fierfek_, I'm going to be in the market for an entirely new outfit here."

"That was close," Carth muttered, looking at the dead monster. "You all right?"

"Yeah, all except for smelling like the wrong end of a Hutt's ass," the commando replied, visibly restraining himself from wiping at the fluid with his hands. "By the Force… Where's my rifle?"

Wordlessly, the pilot handed the commando his rifle. Taking it reverently, Kagi turned and shot the rancor in the face. "Schutta."

Mission raised an eyebrow. "So, now that we've gotten past the rancor, the back entrance to the Vulkar base is right there," she said, pointing to the door on the far end of the chamber. "We ready to go?"

Nodding, Kagi turned away from the dead rancor and made his way up toward the doorway. As they approached, the infrared sensor triggered the doorway to open, surprising the two Vulkar aliens standing near a doorway at the far end of the new corridor. The quartet opened fire immediately, burning down the aliens as they began reaching for their personal shield controls.

Not bothering to check the chewed-upon corpse near their door, Kagi led them forward, toward the next door. It turned out that the door was actually an elevator. Keying it open by way of the access pad next to it, the soldier led the group into the elevator car and pressed the only button on the control panels.

The door slid shut, and up they went.


	6. Into the Vulkar Base

**A/N:** I took artistic license in a couple places here, and made a reference to another much-loved game. Shouldn't be too hard to catch. Reccommended listening is "Infiltrating ShinRa Headquarters" for the first part of the base, then "Who Am I?" for the garage level. Both are from the FF7 soundtrack.

* * *

Kagi was the first out of the elevator, sweeping the small corridor the elevator had released them on with the barrel of his blaster rifle. Nothing moved. Aside from them, the only things in the room with them were a series of crates, or perhaps sealed air ventilators, lined up along either side of the central pathway. 

Nodding back into the elevator, the commando crept forward quietly, quickly joined by his comrades. They gathered at the doorway into the base proper; thankfully, it wasn't equipped with an infrared sensor, the way that the ones in the sewer had been. This door had a keypad mechanism more similar to that of the _Endar Spire_.

Kagi pushed away thoughts of the warship as he keyed open the door, glancing out into the hallway beyond. Nothing moved beyond the doorway. Across from him was another door. Just to his right, paired with an identical copy across the hall, was another door. Another pair of doors beyond them, and then a curve in the corridor.

"So what are we looking for again?" Mission asked in a whisper.

"Prototype swoop accelerator that the Vulkars stole from the Beks," Carth answered, likewise whispering. "We need to get that back and win a swoop race so we can win our commander's freedom."

"Oh."

Putting his comrades' banter out of his mind, the commando stepped out into the hall. As he did, a blaster bolt shot past his head, spraying sparks from the nearby wall. He jumped back into the storage room, catching sight of a combat droid marching toward him as he did so.

Letting out an inarticulate battle roar, Zaalbar rushed around the corner, and more blaster fire was heard. Kagi leaned out to cover their furry companion, but the sound of metal shrieking and bending reached his ears, just before he saw the battle droid collapse to the ground, its head and blaster arm forcibly removed by the Wookie's monstrous strength.

Nodding appreciably, Kagi stepped out into the hallway, looking at their choice of doors. The others joined him.

"Hmm, five doors, four of us," Mission mused. "Split up?"

"Bad idea," Carth replied, shaking his head. "They could isolate us and take us out one at a time that way. Best if we stick together."

"Also makes it easier for us to find what we're looking for," Kagi said, looking from one door to the other. "Okay, I'm going to call one totally at random here." He pointed to the far left door. "That looks like a good place to start. Let's go."

In near-silence, the quartet crept up to the door in question. No more threats presented themselves, and aside from the sounds of their movement, there was no other sound in the base. It almost seemed like it was deserted.

At the door, Kagi tapped the access panel, causing it to hiss open. Before him, a Duros was hunched over a counter, knife in hand, and appeared to be chopping some sort of vegetable. A cook, obviously.

The Duros reacted quickly to their presence, turning and spotting them. The alien took half a second to realize that they weren't friendly, and drew back his arm, hurling his knife at Kagi's head.

Instinctively, the soldier leapt to the right, his right hand drawing his vibroblade from its boot sheath and throwing it right back toward the alien. Unlike the cook's, his thrown weapon had been on the mark; it imbedded itself in the Duros' chest with a wet thud.

Kagi ran forward, clapping his left hand over the Duros' mouth to silence him, even as he pulled the vibroblade out and slid it quickly across his throat. Letting the dead alien sag to the floor, the commando stood up, taking a rag off the counter. He used it to wipe the blood off his weapon before returning it to his boot sheath, then tossed the rag onto the counter again.

Mission walked up, stepping gingerly over the dead alien, her face paled considerably. "Did you have to kill him?" she asked.

"He attacked first," Kagi replied. "And we had to keep him quiet, so the rest of the base wouldn't be alerted." At the expression on her face, he laid his gloved right hand on her shoulder. "I'm sorry to get you involved in all this, Mission, but this sneaking around is a business that I'm very familiar with. It involves a lot of killing in cold blood, and it's something we have to do."

The Twi'lek girl nodded dully, looking at the blaster in her hands.

Straightening up, the commando gestured Zaalbar over. When the Wookie approached, Kagi leaned up to whisper into his ear, "Keep your eye on her, would you? And next time you want to rip something apart, do it with less volume. Remember, stealth ninja action."

Zaalbar quietly grumbled his assent, then placed a big furred hand on Mission's shoulder.

Carth walked up beside Kagi, and the two soldiers looked at the two doors out of the galley. "Right or straight?" Carth asked.

"Asteroid, shield, laser?" the commando returned.

"Loser chooses," Carth said.

"Done," Kagi replied, lifting his left fist into the air. Carth did likewise, and the two of them shook their fists in the air once, twice, three times, and on the fourth repetition, Kagi extended the first finger of his hand, while Carth kept his hand in a fist.

"Asteroid," the pilot remarked. "You lose."

"Flyboys would pick asteroid," the commando muttered, then pointed to the door on the right.

Nodding, Carth keyed the access panel and the door slid open, revealing a spacious inner area with a pillar-like structure in the center of the area. Three Vulkar gang members were in the area, one wandering around aimlessly while the other two stood guard at the structure.

Stepping back into the shelter of the doorway, Kagi leveled his blaster rifle and fired, pitching over the meandering Vulkar in a hail of blaster fire. The other two immediately drew weapons and returned fire, their bolts hitting the doorframe or passing the commando to strike the inner wall of the galley.

His three comrades took cover where they could and opened fire, their bolts haranguing the two guards near the pillar. As the first guard exploded in a storm of sparks, Kagi revised his knowledge on the situation; the other guard was probably a droid as well.

A stray blaster bolt cut past Kagi's leg, not directly striking him, but burning through his pants leg and slicing across the skin beneath it. Hissing, the commando stepped back and pressed his hand to his leg. It came back bloody, so he tore a strip of fabric from his sleeve and wrapped it over the minor wound to staunch the bleeding.

As he turned his attention back to the firefight, the last Vulkar guard, which indeed had been a droid, exploded in a similar cascade of sparks. Moving out, blasters ready, Kagi and Carth swept the main area, keeping their eyes open for any sudden attacks.

For her part, Mission ran to the door the droids had been guarding and began slicing into its security systems. After a few moments, the door yielded to her experience, and the group quickly realized they had stumbled upon an armory; two footlockers, a metal box, a work desk with droid parts on its surface, and a pile of droid parts in the corner were testament of this.

"Jackpot," the young girl muttered, kneeling down in front of the footlocker at the far end. "What've we got here? Vibration cell, mesh underlay, heavy combat suit, military suit, a disruptor, and a frag mine." Without preamble, she handed the mine back to Kagi, who slipped the device into his utility pouch.

"Unless any of you want the disruptor, I say we leave it," Kagi said, turning the vibration cell over in his hands. After a moment, he tossed it back into the footlocker.

"Not me," Carth replied, patting his blaster pistols.

Zaalbar growled a negative, and Mission shook her head. The weapon stayed.

"Get one of those armors for yourself, Mission," Kagi said. "It'll give you some protection against blasterfire."

Mission nodded once, then tested the weight of the armors. Surprisingly, the 'heavy' combat suit turned out to be lighter, and it was into that one she slipped. Unfortunately, the armor was a tad bulky for her; even tightening its straps as much as they could be didn't stop it from bouncing around on her when she moved, eliciting an irritated grumble.

The commando shrugged. "Your choice, Mission. Keep it or leave it."

She pondered for a moment, then unstrapped her belt from her pants. Before any of them could question her actions, she pulled the armor suit down as low as it could go on her form. Catching on, Kagi and Carth both assisted her by holding the armor in place while she secured her belt around it. The setup looked ridiculous, but at least it was staying in place.

"Alright, next box," Kagi said, nudging open the footlocker with his boot. Shouldering his rifle, he leaned down, reached into the box, and produced an armful of weaponry. "Got a heavy blaster, an ion blaster, and an ion rifle. Don't know about you guys, but I'm keeping that rifle just in case we run into any more droids. Any takers for the rest of it?"

Without preamble, Mission reached forward and plucked the heavy blaster pistol, tossing her lighter model into the box. Shrugging, Carth reached forward and took the ion blaster, holstering it in one of his currently-empty holsters.

Kagi leaned his blaster rifle against his leg, then reached back with both hands and slid the ion rifle into the special slot along the bottom of his utility pouch, designed specifically for holding spare rifles.

While he was doing that, Zaalbar busied himself by reaching into the metal box, coming out with his hands full of spherical objects. "Grenades," he rumbled in his native language. Two concussion, two frag, and two ion. He slipped one of each into his bandolier, then handed the rest to Kagi, who distributed them among the others.

"Guess we're done here," the commando said. "Ready to roll?"

The others nodded their assent, and he turned to exit the armory. As he did so, he caught sight of the security panel across the hall from them. "Well, well," he said. "Just what we needed. Mission, get in there and see what you can do."

"You got it," the Twi'lek replied, pulling out her pouch of slicing tools and setting them on the panel. She went to work. After a moment, she called over her shoulder, "Okay, I've got us a map of the whole base downloaded. Doesn't look like they have any place they'd store the accelerator on this level, except for the armory. Which, we already know, doesn't have it. There is an elevator down to their swoop garage, back the way we came. The accelerator might be down there."

"Good work, Mission," Kagi said, carefully watching the surrounding area. "See what else you can do for us."

"On it." There was another pause, more sounds of computer interaction, then a series of hydraulic hisses and rumblings from various points in the base. "Okay, I've just locked open all the security doors in this level. Let me slice into the security cams to see what I can find. Oh. Hey, I see us." In a moment of silliness, she turned and waved to the corner near them. "Okay, serious now…"

Kagi stared at the corner she had been waving at, and just barely made out the holocam hidden in a recessed port.

"Hrm, barracks… Wow, that's a lot of ugly."

"What is it?" Carth asked, looking over her shoulder.

"Eight Vulkars in the barracks," she replied. "Let's see what I can do to… Ahh, here we go." She manipulated several keystrokes, and then the sound of a massive electrical discharge reached them, the static from the sudden outburst causing Zaalbar's fur to stand on end, and the Wookie to groan irritably.

"That… didn't sound very healthy," Kagi noted.

"I overloaded a power conduit on them," Mission said. "Missed one of them, though. Moving on… Recreation room, got a bug-eye and a no-nose in there…"

The commando smirked at her colorful descriptors for Rodians and Duros.

"What the frak?" she said suddenly. "They've got a _pool_ here?"

"Are you serious?" Carth asked, chuckling. He leaned over her shoulder again to look at the holoimage she was studying, then laughed aloud. "By the Force, they _do_ have a pool."

Kagi turned back to them, smirking. "Hey, even the scum's gotta relax every now and again."

"They're not going to be doing any relaxing anytime soon," the Twi'lek replied. "No water in the pool, and it's stuffed with a bunch of crates of noxious chemicals. Ah well, their loss." She went back to her work. "Ah, here's the elevator to the garage." She winced. "Ew, but there are three heavy turrets guarding it. Small room, too, so there's no place to hide."

"So much for rushing them," Kagi muttered. "Anything you can do?"

"Gimme a sec," she replied, her brow furrowing as she hacked and sliced into the system. After a moment, it beeped at her. "Good, there. Security systems shut down. We can go in whenever we want."

"Good, let's go now. You said it was back the way we came?"

She nodded, exiting out of the system and returning her tools to her utility belt. "Around that corner we didn't take."

"Alright, let's go."

The quartet shoved off from wherever they had come to rest, and started back in the direction they had come. But as soon as they passed into the galley area, a droid in the adjacent eating area, now opened through the security doors that Mission had unlocked, turned and opened fire.

Jumping back out of the line of fire, Kagi laid his blaster rifle down, pulling out the ion rifle he had just picked up. As Zaalbar leaned out to fire at the droid, Kagi dropped to a knee, leaning out past the Wookie and aiming at the droid's head. He fired, and an ionized energy bolt shot out of the barrel, impacting on the droid's head and bursting like a sunbeam. Energy crawled up the droid's frame, then its head simply exploded and it pitched over, dead.

Beyond it, a human woman cowered near a bench, hiding from the blaster fight. Kagi signaled his comrades not to fire, then approached her. "Miss? You alright?"

"Please don't hurt me!" she cried, hiding her head behind her hands. "I just serve the food here, that's all! I'm not like the others, I'm not even a Black Vulkar! Please don't kill me!"

"Calm down," Kagi said, holding his left hand out placatingly. "I'm not going to hurt you. We just came to get something that was stolen from us. So I'm going to let you go. Can you find your own way out?"

She nodded hesitantly. "Now that you've killed the guards who were supposed to watch me, I think I could find my way out of here."

He nodded and gave her a warm smile. "You do that, then. Quickly, before the Vulkars see you."

"I… I don't know how I can ever repay you!" she uttered, joy blossoming on her features. "Thank you!"

As she turned and ran, the quartet moved the other way, pausing to let Kagi retrieve his blaster rifle. At the junction back to the corridor they had initially been in, Kagi paused, looking out to see if there were any security units waiting.

Seeing none, he waved his comrades forward, then stepped out into the corridor, turning left, away from the elevator that had brought them there. Almost immediately, the corridor turned right again, and he could see the elevator foyer that would lead down to the garage.

Just before entering the foyer, he waved his comrades to a halt, then cautiously edged into it. The turrets ignored him. Painfully slowly, he crept forward, right up to the elevator. Still no reaction. Keeping his eye on the turrets, he reached out and pressed the button to call the elevator. Nothing.

Satisfied that Mission's slicing skills were as good as she claimed, he turned back and whistled sharply. Within a moment, the three of them had returned to his side, and the elevator doors slid open. They entered, and Carth, nearest the panel, pressed the down button.

The elevator lurched once, and down they went. After a few moments, the elevator lurched to a halt, and Kagi stepped out first, his blaster rifle leading.

No threats immediately presented themselves, so he waved his comrades forward. He paused once they were all out, and took stock of their surroundings. Two swoop bikes were on the repair racks, and for a brief moment, Kagi considered sabotaging them. Then he shook his head and decided against it. It wouldn't be very sportsmanlike, even though he knew that none of the Vulkars would hesitate to sabotage a Beks bike. Besides, something told him those bikes wouldn't be raced anyway.

Aside from that, there were a pair of broken droids collecting rust, one next to the elevator, one a few meters in front of it. Across the ceiling, two grappling claws, likely used to move swoop bikes, slid back and forth aimlessly in their racks. He figured they were broken.

As he stood there, taking in his surroundings, he suddenly saw a Vulkar tech come around a corner ahead of them. Acting on instinct, his right hand reached down to draw his vibroblade, which he threw across the intervening distance with a practiced ease. With a grunt, the Vulkar went down, the blade imbedded in the alien's throat.

Moving to retrieve his weapon, Kagi pulled out the datapad onto which Mission had downloaded the base schematics, turning it in his hand until the layout on the map was identically-aligned to his current position within the base.

Kneeling down next to the dead Vulkar, Kagi pulled his vibroblade out of the corpse's throat, wiped the blood off on its uniform, then sheathed the weapon again and picked up the datapad. The path to the right went further, but to the left, seemed to go deeper into the base.

Deeper usually meant more important stuff.

Gesturing with the datapad in hand, Kagi turned left. Mission and Zaalbar followed close behind him, with Carth taking up the rear.

"Anybody get the feeling that we're walking into a trap?" Carth asked.

"You always feel like we're walking into a trap," Kagi replied. "Still, it is pretty spooky in here, all by ourselves." Glancing over his shoulder at Mission, the commando grinned and lowered his voice considerably before continuing, "Kinda makes you wonder if they weren't secretly working on some sort of regenerative serum that they completely screwed up on, causing people to turn into zombies and walk the planet in a never-ending search for fresh meat."

The young Twi'lek girl shuddered violently as she followed him around the corner. "Stop it!" she hissed, staring at the walls around her. "This place _is_ creepy. The sooner we get out of here the better."

Snickering, Kagi led the group down to another intersection, where he paused long enough to disable a gas mine in the floor. Checking the datapad again, he turned to the left, creeping along the wall as quietly as he could. He passed the first door and stopped outside the second one. Checking the datapad one last time, he nodded to his comrades, then put the datapad away.

Carth and Mission ran across the door, taking up positions on the far side. Kagi crouched down, keeping his left hand on the access panel. Zaalbar towered over him, his bowcaster humming with charged energy. All his comrades nodded their readiness.

Kagi triggered the access panel.

Nothing happened.

Exchanging glances with the others, the commando stood up, glaring at the uncooperative panel. He swore. "Needs a security card."

Mission frowned. "We didn't pick one up."

The commando calmly reached into his pouch, pulling out the frag mine they'd picked up in the armory. "Yes we did," he replied smoothly. "Stand back."

He began setting the mine on the door lock, adding a blast cap over it to funnel all the destructive energy in. The others cleared back behind him, hoping that Kagi knew as much about setting demolitions charges as he knew about retrieving them. Finally, the SpecForces commando rigged a remote detonator, and returned to his place next to the door frame.

With a meaningful glance toward his comrades, he pressed his left thumb down on the trigger button, and the blast echoed throughout the seemingly-empty sublevel. Returning the trigger to his utility pouch, Kagi calmly strode into the room.

Inside, two Twi'leks, one male and one female, were waiting, along with several thugs.

"Looks like we have visitors," the male said in his own language. "Lackeys conned by Gadon Thek into trying to steal Brejik's swoop engine accelerator, I bet!"

"Brejik stole that engine from Gadon," Mission retorted in Basic. "It was never yours to begin with!"

"Well I didn't go through all the trouble of acquiring this prototype so you could steal it back for that old fool!" the male Twi'lek snapped back.

"Would you like me to dispose of these Bek spies, Kandon?" the female purred.

"No," the male replied, holding out a hand to steady her. "I see you aren't wearing the Hidden Bek colors, so I'm guessing you aren't part of that feeble old man's gang. You must be a freelance mercenary."

"How about you hand over that engine so I don't blast you?" Kagi replied menacingly, holding his blaster rifle level.

The Twi'lek didn't seem phased by the threat. "Instead of stealing the prototype for the Beks, why don't you come work for us? The Black Vulkars could use someone like you."

"I guess you didn't hear me when I said it before," Kagi said, bringing his rifle to bear on the Twi'lek. "If you don't give me that accelerator, your friends back there will be scraping your _lekku_ off the walls."

"Be smart!" the Twi'lek said, panic rising in his voice. "Gadon is old news! He's a blind fool in more ways than one! Brejik is a visionary; soon he'll control the entire Lower City! Don't shackle yourself to a losing team."

"Basic, _di'kut_!" Kagi shouted. "Do you speak it?"

The Twi'lek sighed, unimpressed by his antics. "I can see there's not much chance of convincing you to come join–"

Kagi gestured with his left hand in midsentence, and all four of them opened fire on the loud-mouthed Twi'lek, cutting off his words in midsentence. As the female Twi'lek and the two Vulkar aliens stared in shock, Mission produced a plasma grenade that she had taken from one of the Vulkars they'd killed, armed it, and threw it at the female Twi'lek.

The grenade stuck to her chest and hissed menacingly, only seconds from exploding. Zaalbar, seeing the glowing grenade, quickly reached over Kagi's head, picking up a heavy crate filled with Force-knew-what and throwing it at the female Twi'lek.

The crate caught her full in the chest, its weight knocking her back to fall down in between the two Vulkar aliens. Half a second later, the plasma grenade exploded violently, killing all three of them. The shockwave lifted the male Twi'lek's body in the air, folding him halfway over the desk in front of Kagi.

Carth, never having seen a plasma grenade in action before, merely blinked at the tiny weapon's raw power. "Wow," he said. "You know, plasma grenades are illegal in the Republic."

"Yeah, and now you know why," Kagi replied, stepping over the bodies and turning the near corner. He took only a moment to disable, rather than recover, the mine in his path, then reached out with his left hand and picked up the accelerator.

Or at least, he tried to. He managed to get it up a few inches before the heavy object fell out of his grasp and clanged against the floor. Frowning, he handed his blaster rifle to Mission, then crouched down and scooped it up in both arms. The accelerator was the length of his blaster rifle, but massed easily four times as much.

"Well, we got what we came for," Carth said. "We'd better get it back to the Beks and hope we still have enough time."

Nodding, Kagi allowed someone else to lead the way as they progressed toward the Lower City…

---

"You have returned. Do you have… Ah, I see that you do."

A jolt ran through Gadon's desk as Kagi dropped the accelerator, as gently as he could, onto it. "Here you go, Gadon," he said, slightly winded from having to carry the fifty-kilo accelerator as far as he did, without being able to distribute its weight among his other items. "One swoop accelerator prototype, as requested."

"I was beginning to wonder if you would make it," Gadon said, running his hand over the engine prototype. "The race is tomorrow, and my mechanics need time to install the prototype into the swoop engine of our bike."

"Yeah, about that," Kagi replied, laying his left hand possessively on the accelerator. "I scratch your back…"

"…And I'll scratch yours," Gadon said with a nod. "Don't worry, I'm a man of my word. I promised you could ride in the swoop race under the Hidden Bek banner, and I'm still going to let you do that." The aging man paused for a moment, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "I'll even go you one better. I'm going to let you ride the swoop bike with the prototype accelerator installed. You won't stand a chance without it."

"Gadon, you can't be serious!" Zaerdra objected. Kagi was starting to get a little tired of the multi-toned Twi'lek butting in. "We need one of our best riders on that bike! We can't let some rookie take the prototype engine into the race."

"Excuse me," Kagi said, a harsh edge in his voice as he glared at her. "I may not have ever been in a swoop race before, but I _have_ had extensive training on the operation of _military_ swoop bikes in combat operations, and I think that more than qualifies me to ride on the little toy versions you use in these races."

Zaerdra returned his glare, daring him with her eyes to try and put her in her place again.

With a smooth and practiced precision, Kagi brought his right leg up, resting his boot rest on top of a cargo crate in front of the desk. The fingers of his right hand brushed idly against the top of his sheathed vibroblade, his way of challenging her to try something.

"Now hold on, you two!" Gadon shouted, slamming his fist against the desk. "There'll be none of this bloodletting going on in my base. Zaerdra, back down. Mister Vayun, I do suggest not provoking my people within our own base. Now, as I was saying," he said, his voice as solid as ice, "there is a reason why I'm letting you ride the prototype. The accelerator isn't stable, and there's a chance it could explode during the race. I can't ask one of my own riders to take the risk; they'll be racing unmodified swoops. You'll be the only one using the prototype."

"So if I become one with the Force, one of them may still pull it out of the bag," Kagi said.

The gang leader nodded in response.

The commando shrugged. "Sounds fine to me. It'll be just like that time on Dxun, riding through beast-infested jungle with a leaking fuel cell and a shot engine, _and_ Mandalorians shooting at me. I'll take it."

At this, Gadon regarded him warily. Silence covered the meeting for several long moments, then the gang leader shrugged it off. "You can stay here tonight," he said. "Like I said, the mechanics need to install the accelerator, so you won't be able to practice your riding. It shouldn't matter, though. With your military background, you should be fine. Just try to relax, and we'll take you to the track in the morning."


	7. To the Victor Goes the Spoils

**A/N:** This was the hardest one to write thus far. There's not a whole lot you can do with swoop racing, especially since I avoid it at all costs. So now, onto the theme music for this chapter! For the swoop race, selected music is "The Chase Through Coruscant" from Attack of the Clones. For Bastila's escape and the subsequent fight, "Here She Comes" from Xenosaga II. And for the dialogue afterwards to the end, "I Am Free" also from Xenosaga II, which is Bastila's theme song.

* * *

Kagi followed the Rodian Bek member into the swoop track, already plotting escape routes and objects that could provide cover; he mentally recited one of the combat laws of the universe: If your attack is going too well, you're probably walking into an ambush.

Worse yet, he didn't even have his blaster rifle; such blatantly-offensive weapons weren't allowed on the course, lest some hapless rider be tempted to 'improve' the standings in his, her, or its favor. All he had was his trusty vibroblade, strapped securely into its sheath on his right boot.

The Rodian led the commando over to an area where several Hidden Beks swoop bikes and their riders were gearing up, waiting for their turns on the race course. The mechanic, a hammer-headed Ithorian, approached Kagi.

"So you're the one who's going to ride this swoop bike, eh?" he asked in his own language. "Don't worry. I've been working on the accelerator and stability won't be a problem. I hope."

Kagi raised an eyebrow. "You hope?"

"I give you my word that the bike won't fail on you," the Ithorian answered. "Now, Gadon said you've flown military swoops before. Do you want me to give you the basics on race swoops?"

"Are the controls much different than standard military swoops?" Kagi asked.

"No. They're remarkably similar."

"Then no thanks, I don't need a refresher course."

The Ithorian nodded. "Very well, then let me explain the rules. You may have been expecting all the riders to go out at once, and whichever finishes first wins, correct?"

"You mean it doesn't work like that?"

"No. Each rider goes out one at a time, and their heats are timed. Whoever has the best heat wins."

"Ah." Kagi smirked. "Well, that just makes it all the easier for me. Any tips?"

"Yes. Beware of the debris on the track. It won't destroy your swoop, but it will slow you down marginally. I suggest hitting as many accelerator pads as you can. They'll boost your speed significantly."

The commando nodded. "Got it."

"Go talk to the race announcer when you want to run a heat," the mechanic said, then returned to tweaking the Hidden Beks' swoop bikes.

Kagi turned away and began to walk around the waiting area, taking careful stock of the other racers. He saw an Aqualish, a female Twi'lek, a Rodian, and one of the Vulkar aliens. He couldn't guess which gang the others belonged to, and so rated them as high probable threats. Assuming that there were more racers either out running heats or in readiness to run them, he began to make his way toward the race announcer.

The Rodian looked over and nodded to him as he passed. He returned it, not knowing whether it was a simple greeting or if there was some hidden meaning behind it.

As he approached the announcer, a male Duros, he saw a force cage, guarded by a Vulkar alien wielding a nasty-looking double-vibroblade. He glanced at the figure inside the cage, started to speak to the announcer, then stopped, looking back in the direction of the cage.

Holding up a hand to signify the announcer to wait, he stepped around the counter and stopped about two meters away from the cage. The Vulkar alien grumbled inarticulately at him, but otherwise did nothing.

The figure contained within the cage was a human female, as evinced by the…rather revealing attire she was clad in, which consisted of no more than undergarments. She was swaying slightly in place, as if stunned. He wondered at the cause of that for a moment, then his eyes fell on her throat.

A collar was secured around her throat, somewhat bronze in color, with a display monitor on the right side of her throat and a small row of blinking lights. The collar went all the way around her throat, and a section of it rose up to wrap around and cover her ears.

He nodded slowly as he realized what he was seeing. Neural disruptor. They were pretty much outlawed by Republic security forces, but they were big in the criminal underworld. Capable of keeping the unlucky wearer in a dazed stupor for days at a time, several claims have been made about neural disruptors causing permanent brain damage.

Then his analytical mind shut off as he suddenly realized… He recognized this woman!

Tilting his head to the right, he bent forward, trying to look up underneath her loose-hanging hair to see her face. Her eyes were closed, rendering him unable to determine their color, but the shape of her nose and lips, as well as the color, and the style and color of her hair…

_The woman from my dream, my vision,_ he thought, unconsciously reaching out his left hand to try and touch her, see if she was real.

The Vulkar alien growled, reaching out and slapping his hand away. "You try touch prisoner again, you lose finger," the alien said in very poor Basic.

Kagi glared at the alien, envisioning a nice new home for that double-vibroblade he was wielding. He obediently lowered his hand, but did not lean back.

_By the Force, she's a looker,_ he thought to himself, smirking slightly. _If she really is Commander Shan, this might not be such a bad assignment after all…_

Shaking himself free of those thoughts, Kagi turned to the announcer, smirk still in place, and said, "I'm here to race."

The Duros nodded. "Okay, let's see who your sponsor is. Ah, the Hidden Beks. Very well, just give me a moment to make sure the track is cleared…" The blue-skinned alien's hands ran across the keys of the station before him, then he nodded. "Okay, nobody's running a heat right now. You ready?"

"What's the best time?" Kagi asked, his gaze slipping over to the bound woman. He forcibly returned his attention to the announcer.

"Redros of the Vulkars has the best time so far," the Duros answered. "Thirty-eight forty-three. Good, but not the best we've seen. I doubt it'll stand up."

The commando grinned. "Oh, I intend to see to that personally."

The race announcer chuckled. "Ready to run your heat, then?"

"You bet."

"Right this way."

---

Back inside the Hidden Beks base, Carth, Mission, and Zaalbar were gathered with Gadon around a monitor displaying the race track. They'd watched half a dozen competitors so far, but Gadon hadn't seemed impressed with any of them.

The gang leader glanced to a side panel as new information appeared. "Ah, your friend is going to run his heat next. Let's see what he's capable of, shall we?"

---

Kagi settled himself into the seat of the swoop bike, letting himself sink into its well-worn contours. As he pulled down on his gloves to tighten them, he found himself thinking back to the Vulkars' prisoner, being auctioned off as a prize to whoever won this swoop race.

A flash of anger shot through him. _Animals,_ he thought, growling low in his throat. _To disgrace a woman like her by handing her out like some pleasure slave. I swear, by the Force, _I_ will be the one to carry this day._

With a sensation of finality, the commando slammed down the visor of his helmet and wrapped his hands around the handlebars of the swoop bike, gripping them tightly. His eyes went to the starting lamp blazing from the ceiling above him. He twisted the accelerator in his right hand, revving up the bike's engine. He could _feel_ the raw power roaring through the vehicle.

The starting lamp flashed green. He released the swoop's brakes.

The race was on.

---

Despite herself, Mission let out a squeal of excitement as Kagi's swoop bike tore out of the gates, accelerating rapidly at a pace no normal swoop bike could match. As they watched, the commando shifted his weight to the left, sending the bike slipping deftly pass a protruding piece of debris on the track. He immediately traversed back to the right, avoiding more obstacles.

"Now he needs to hit one of those acceleration pads to pick up a boost of speed," Gadon said. "It'll shave a few fractions of a second off his time, but those fractions count."

The group watched, expecting the commando to soar over a magnetic accelerator, but he slipped past it as though it were a piece of debris to be avoided. The pitch of the engine revved up as he switched gears, drowning out Gadon's groan.

"Oh, you cocky bastard," he said.

"What's going on?" Carth asked, blinking between the race and the gang leader.

"That son of a Hutt's purposely cutting it close," Gadon replied. "He's going to just barely beat the best time so far, that way if somebody else beats the new time he sets, he won't have to work so hard to surpass them."

"But that could backfire on him," Mission said. "Somebody else could set a new time way higher than his."

Gadon nodded. "Therein lies the problem." He reached out and tapped the display screen. "Well, he's finished with that heat, and he beat the best time. Here's hoping his little game pays off."

---

Kagi couldn't help but grin as he sauntered back into the waiting area after his heat. The Rodian racer regarded him steadily; he noticed that the Vulkar the alien had previously been talking to was now gone, probably out running his own heat.

"You did it!" the Ithorian mechanic exclaimed. "You got the top time! Your military training surely has paid off in this. Are you sure you haven't raced swoops before?"

"Raced for time and fame, no." The commando grinned. "But maybe I'll tell you about the time on Dxun, when I was racing for my _life_."

"Wait a minute," the Ithorian said, his attention behind Kagi. The commando turned. "Look at the board! One of the Vulkars just beat your time. Gah, Redros. I should've known."

"It'll be fine," Kagi replied nonchalantly. "The accelerator still holding together?"

"Beautifully," the Ithorian answered. "You're good for two or three more heats."

As he made his way back to the announcer, the commando saw the Vulkar thug giving him a condescending expression. He stopped in his tracks, turned and walked right up to the alien, and watched with satisfaction as the smug look wavered.

"Okay, listen up partner, because I'm only going to say this once," he said. "You may have a little bit of skill on a swoop, but you're talking to a guy who spent five years cutting the guts out of Mandalorians and hanging them from trees on Dxun. So if you think, even for a second, that you're even remotely on the same level as me, I invite you into the nearest back alley where I can introduce you to my friend, Mister Seven-Inch." He patted his sheathed vibroblade. "You dig?"

There was a moment's delay before the Vulkar shot back, "After I wipe the track with you, your words won't be so big, outsider."

Kagi laughed aloud, then shook his head and turned to the Duros. "Announcer! Time for my next heat. I'm going to smoke this clown like a deathstick."

---

"Looks like he's getting serious this time," Carth said.

"He'd better be!" Gadon replied. "He just insulted the Vulkars' best swoop rider _and_ fighter."

"They're so going to get in a fight," Mission groaned.

---

Things seemed to be going a lot slower on this run. Or at least, he was perceiving things slower. Perhaps he had gotten into the groove of racing and could react faster. Either way, some would view his performance as nothing less than stunning.

He sideslipped left around a piece of debris, then angled immediately for the magnetic accelerator beyond it. There was another debris pile almost directly in his path; most sane riders wouldn't have touched that accelerator. But Kagi wasn't most riders.

Inertia slammed him back into the seat as the accelerator rocketed his swoop forward, directly toward the debris pile. He didn't even try to avoid it. Instead, he pumped up the repulsor field of the bike, causing him to bounce into the air, sailing _over_ the debris instead of around it.

Once clear, he reduced the repulsor field and held tight, bracing himself against the jolt of the bike's reduced field hitting the ground again. He landed directly on top of a magnetic accelerator, boosting his speed again.

In the middle of his speed boost, he shifted gears on the swoop, further increasing his speed. He leaned forward into the wind, the finishing line in sight. He knew that he had blown away the Vulkar's time, but that wasn't his concern.

He smiled beneath the helmet, relishing in the feeling of absolute freedom born by speed and inertia. Nothing in the galaxy that he had ever experienced could match it.

And then he was over the finish line, and his hands instinctively cranked back the gears, gripping the brake on the left handle. He swung the swoop's rear end around, bleeding off inertia. As he doffed his helmet, he grinned, imagining the infuriated face of the Vulkar back on the other side of the track.

Ah, the sweet aroma of victory…

---

"Ladies and gentlemen," the Duros announcer said, "I would like to announce the winner of this year's swoop race! Put your hands together and show your appreciation for one of the most daring riders this swoop track has ever seen!"

As the other riders applauded, Kagi slowly, theatrically raised his arms out to his sides, angling them off-center, his smirk widening. He spun slowly in place, adding to the effect of his little victory pose.

"Through your skill and courage," the announcer continued, "you have proven yourself the premier swoop rider on Taris, and brought great glory to the Hidden Bek gang. Now, here to present the champion's prize, Brejik of the Black Vulkars."

Kagi narrowed his eyes as the so-called leader of the Vulkars, a man who looked like he'd been too close to a misfiring ion engine, puffed up his chest. This idiot was going to try and pull a fast one…

"People, hear me!" Brejik called, his voice grating on Kagi's nerves already. The boy's voice sounded like somebody trying to skin a gurr-kat. "Before I present the so-called champion of the Beks with their prize, there is something you must know: the winning rider cheated!"

As the other riders looked to him, Kagi calmly straightened, pointing his finger threateningly at the smaller man. "You'd better not be trying to cheat me, Brejik," he said quietly. "I'd hate to have to gut you on the tracks." The commando paused, then shook his head. "Eh, I take it back. I'd gut you anywhere, with pleasure."

"Your swoop bike was using a prototype accelerator, clearly an unfair advantage!" Brejik said, pointing an accusing finger back at him. "Because of this Hidden Bek treachery, I'm withdrawing the Vulkars' share of the prize."

"You can't do this, Brejik," the announcer said, stepping in before Kagi could reply. "You know the rules. Nobody's allowed to withdraw a victory prize after the race. It goes against all our most sacred traditions."

"You old fool!" Brejik snapped imperiously. "Your traditions are _nothing_ to me. _I_ am the wave of the future! If I want to withdraw the prize and sell this woman on the slave market myself, nobody can stop me!"

Just about the time when Kagi was deciding whether to continue with the banter or simply start playing the Stabbity Game, a cultured female voice calmly stated, "_I_ might have something to say about that, Brejik."

All eyes in the racing pit turned toward the force cage and the trapped woman. Only, she wasn't as trapped as everyone thought. Her left hand reached up and clenched into a fist, and some invisible force seized the Vulkar guarding her, slamming him back into her cage. As he hit, his double-vibroblade smashed the locking mechanism, causing the front of the cage to flip open.

As the Vulkar tried to stand, the woman's foot impacted solidly with the alien's face, shattering his nose and shoving fragments of bone up into his brain. Stretching out her left hand, the double-vibroblade leapt up into it, and she spun the twin-bladed weapon around her hands before holding it in a ready stance on her right side.

"What?" Brejik exclaimed. "Impossible! You were restrained by a neural disruptor! How could you have possibly summoned the will to free yourself?"

The gang leader's answer came in the form of an open-palm slap across his face, delivered by one head-shaking commando. "_Idiot_," Kagi spat. "Did you _not_ see the mystical hand-waving?"

"You underestimate the strength of a Jedi's mind," the woman affirmed. "A mistake you won't live to regret."

"Vulkars, to me!" Brejik cried. "Kill this woman! Kill the swoop rider! Kill them–"

"Less talk, more beat-your-ass!" Kagi shouted, diving on Brejik.

The two of them went down in a tangle of limbs and armor. The gang leader immediately tried to bring his blaster around to fry the commando, a situation that was remedied by taking Brejik's blaster hand firmly and slamming the offending limb down hard on Kagi's bent knee. Something in Brejik's arm snapped, accompanied by the man's shrill shriek, and the blaster clattered to the ground.

Behind him, Kagi heard the sound of metal tearing through flesh, and the rumbling scream of one of the Vulkar aliens. He ignored it, batted Brejik's grasping left hand aside, and closed his hand around the man's throat, began applying pressure.

Before he could satisfyingly choke the life out of the irritating idiot, he felt strong alien hands grab him by the throat and lift him bodily into the air, cutting off his own supply of oxygen. From behind him, he could hear chuckling, and knew immediately that it was the alien he'd threatened who had him. Oh what a way to go, not even able to make good on your threats.

Then, suddenly, the alien grunted, its grip slackening. Kagi heard a thud as he started to fall out of the air, but he never quite hit the ground. He fell back against something soft, felt something equally soft, and slender, secure itself around his waist. Looking down, he saw it was a woman's arm. And not just any woman's arm.

_What the hell?_ he thought. _She _saved_ me? I'd rather have died!_

Then he realized that he was staring down the barrel of Brejik's blaster.

_Damn, should've kept my mouth shut._

Suddenly, he felt the weight of his vibroblade leave his boot sheath, and the weapon shot past his head a moment later, imbedding itself into the gang leader's forehead. His blaster shot wildly off to the side as the man collapsed back to the permacrete, quite dead.

Kagi instantly pushed off the woman, taking the two steps to get to Brejik's side, where he extracted his vibroblade from the man's skull. He wiped the blood off, then started to stand, when he suddenly found himself staring at the point of a double vibroblade. At the other end, the woman's expression was something less than grateful.

"What in the…"

"As for you," she hissed, her voice full of venom. "If you think you can collect me as some prize…"

She stopped suddenly, her eyes widening to the point that he thought they were going to fall out of her head. She _almost_ dropped her weapon, but she recovered herself in time.

"You," she uttered, as though not believing. "You're R…ed Five. One of the commandos from the _Endar Spire_."

'_Red Five'?_ he thought sardonically, raising an eyebrow. _Lady, I didn't fall off the back of a gravtruck yesterday. You were about to call me something else._

"Yeah," he said, pointedly eying the weapon still aimed at his throat. "Mind pointing your pointy somewhere else?"

Shaking off her shock, she quickly lowered the weapon, switching it to her left hand, holding out her right in an offer to help him to his feet. Nodding, he grabbed her hand and pushed up off the balls of his feet, coming up to his full height.

It didn't really amuse him as much as he thought it would that she had to look up at him.

"How did you end up racing for these swoop gangs?" she asked.

"It's a long story," he answered, then stuck out his right hand. "Vayun. Kagi Vayun. SpecForces commando."

She looked at him for a moment, stunned, as though expecting him to know her. At his narrowed eyes, she shook herself free of it and shook his hand firmly. "Bastila Shan," she said. "I'll hear about your misadventures later. We have to get out of here before the Sith show up to sort out this mess. Is there somewhere safe we can go?"

He narrowed his eyes further as he knelt down to start searching Brejik's corpse. Something in her tone had changed, something he didn't like. But it wasn't his place to question her. A few moments' prodding in Brejik's corpse produced something of interest.

He held the double-bladed lightsaber up toward her. "Yours?"

She all but snatched it back from him, nearly taking off his fingers in the process. He sighed. This was going to be a long assignment.

"Yeah, I've got an apartment in the Upper City," he replied tonelessly, suddenly feeling like somebody had compressed his innards with a gravity well. "That was going to be the safe house once I saved you from this clown." He nudged Brejik's body with his boot as he stood up.

"Save me?" she repeated, scoffing. "Is that what you were trying to accomplish by riding in that swoop race? Well as far as rescues go, this is a pretty poor example."

A hot surge of anger rushed through him, and he had to physically restrain himself from going for his vibroblade. "Well maybe you'd like it back in your cell, _your highness_."

The bitter tone in his reply reached through to her, and only fueled her own aggression. "Brejik and his Vulkars would've left you for dead if I hadn't stepped into that fight. You're lucky I was here to get you out of this mess."

He was more or less at his breaking point. Chances were high that one of them would be getting stabbed within the next five seconds. But instead, he closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and stalked away five paces, to the edge of the track, looking down into the nothingness of the Undercity.

"SCHUTTA!" he screamed suddenly into the void, venting as much rage and frustration as he could.

When he turned back toward her, his expression was that of a worker resigning himself to a long day in the mines. "You know what, you can _keep_ your high and mighty attitude. To blazes with you and whatever mission you're on. Wander around the Lower City in just your underwear. I'm sure Carth will find you before some lowlife thug manages to over­–"

"Carth Onasi is alive?" she asked, her tone completely changing. "Finally, some good news. Carth is one of the Republic's best soldiers. He sent _you_ to save me?"

Growling low in his throat, the commando turned and glared lasers at her. "Listen woman, you are about _five_ words from getting two lightsabers' worth of dental work. You want to scrap, you keep pushing my buttons like this. But I guaran-damn-tee you, you would have _much_ better preferred it if I _hadn't_ come to win this blasted race to free you."

Something in his expression, in his stance, or in his voice got through to her; she suddenly looked very scared. She turned away from him, refusing to meet his eyes.

"I…forgive me," she whispered, and he wasn't entirely sure she meant it. "Despite my Jedi training, I still tend to act rashly sometimes."

He didn't immediately respond. Once again, he closed his eyes and took deep breaths, feeling the rage slowly bleed away. He was silent for several minutes, eventually causing her to look in his direction, questioning his silence.

"Forgiven," he said finally, quietly. "Please try to be mindful of your statements in the future. Being a Jedi, it's not hard for you to influence people, either positively or negatively."

She nodded and gave him a game smile. "I'll try. Now please, take me to see Carth. Between the three of us, I'm sure we can figure out some way to get off this planet before the Sith realize we're here."

He didn't answer her immediately. Instead, he began looking around the area, poking and prodding at several bodies. She raised her eyebrow.

"Just what are you doing?"

"Looking for something for you to cover yourself with," he replied, then shrugged and slid off his jacket, holding it out to her.

She glanced down at herself, gasped, and then quickly accepted the jacket, blushing furiously. "Yes, I suppose that would be a good idea…"

---

A short time later, the pair had made their way to the abandoned Upper City apartment that Kagi had woken up in he knew not how long ago. He immediately dropped his pack by the door, kicked his boots across the room, and dove face-first onto the couch.

"Where is Carth?" Bastila asked, looking around the room.

"On his way back," the commando replied, his voice muffled by the cushions, "or out getting supplies, or something. The bomb guy votes that we all sleep until he gets back."

"Sleep?" she repeated, turning to scowl at him. "How can you think of _sleep_ at a time like this? We have to get off this planet before the Sith find us!"

He pushed himself up off the couch with his hands, glaring at her. "Hey, _you_ may not appreciate the fact that Carth and I ran around the Upper City playing tag with Sith patrols, getting _shot_ at by disgruntled alien gangs in the Lower City, having bloody _monsters_ try and take nice hunks of flesh out of us in the Undercity, then crawled through the sewers for hours, fought off the nastiest-smelling piggies I have _ever_ had the misfortune of crossing, and _then_ had to play stealth ninja action all over the Vulkar's base just so that we could get back a damn prototype accelerator and win the swoop race to save _your_ sorry backside, but I, for one, believe that all that effort deserves at _least_ one hour of uninterrupted unconsciousness. Now, you're welcome to go wandering around out in the open, with the entire Sith force looking for you, but don't count on _me_ to come save you if you get busted!"

She stared at him in open-mouthed shock for a moment, then snapped her jaw shut, crossed her arms, and turned away. "Fine," she said, projecting arrogance into her voice. "You can sleep until Carth gets back, but once he does, we're going to…"

It was then that she realized he was already asleep, his gentle snores resonating in the small room. Looking around, she located a small closet, and reached into it. After a moment, she produced a thermal blanket, which she unfolded and carefully draped over the sleeping soldier.

Once that was done, she crouched down by his head, staring at his peaceful face. There was no trace of the hate or anger she was expecting. Just a soldier catching a brief respite from war.

She shook her head. That wasn't what he was. He never was, and never would be a mere soldier.

Tilting her head to the side, she gently traced the scar cutting through his right eyebrow with her fingers, pulling back when his head twitched slightly in response to her feather touch.

Slowly, she ran her hand over his military-cropped hair. Not even that had changed. "You don't even know, do you?" she asked quietly to no one in particular. "You don't even remember what we once were…"


	8. We Need a New Hobby

**A/N:** Once again, guys, there's no recommended listening for this chapter. You're pretty much on your own this time. I just can't seem to find any music that suits for Upper City Taris, except _maybe_ "Under Her Control" from FF8, but I don't recommend that. Anyway, that'll be all for now.

Oh, and consider this your mod use warning. Bastila in my story does not wear the default clothing that she has in the game. She instead wears the special cortosis-weave clothing from the Bastila's Revelation Robes mod, the teal variant.

* * *

_**Her lightsaber buzzed and snapped as she spun it deftly through the air, intercepting the red blade of her opponent, turning away his assaults as she pressed forward, a malicious smile twisting her lips.**_

_**She was enjoying it.**_

_**Her lightsaber struck, intercepted at the last moment by her enemy's crimson blade. Sensing his weakness, she shifted her blade along and under his, knocking it up into the air. Her own blade spun back down, leaving a glowing red scar along the man's dark clothing as he crashed back to the deck.**_

_**Two more Jedi stepped up to either side of her, their lightsabers blazing emerald and cerulean in the dim lightning of the bridge. In front of her, sickening cracking sounds emanated from the throat of a naval officer, the man struggling for breath against an outside force that was choking the life out of him.**_

**_As the officer fell to the deck, lifeless, a figure in a hooded black cloak, not a single inch of his or her skin revealed, stared down the Jedi intruders, spinning a crimson-bladed lightsaber around his or her hand before holding it up in a ready stance behind the back._**

"_**You cannot win, Revan," Bastila told the figure, her hands tightening around the hilt of her own lightsaber. "Do not force me to…"**_

_**The figure interrupted her words with a masculine chuckle, his face hidden behind a forbidding red and black mask. He then twisted his lightsaber again, turning his body slightly to present his right side toward them, taking the lightsaber in a double-handed grip on his left, the point of the blade aimed unerringly at Bastila's head. In the background, another Sith cruiser drifted ever closer to the ship they were on.**_

_**The Jedi advanced.**_

_**Suddenly, Bastila leapt backwards. Not a moment to soon; she saw red light flare from the approaching Sith cruiser, and then the forward section of the bridge exploded in blinding light. The cloaked figure and both of her companions vanished in the blast that knocked her off her feet.**_

_**Pushing herself back to her feet, Bastila deactivated her lightsaber and returned it to her belt, then ran across the deck. She ignored the bodies of the Jedi and dropped to her knees beside the cloaked figure, gently lifting him up off the floor.**_

_**As she stared down at his still form, a tear slipped from the corner of her eye, sliding down her cheek to splash on the figure's fearsome mask.**_

---

Kagi's eyes opened slowly, blurry forms eventually coalescing into the interior furnishings of the apartment on Taris. He realized that he was in a more comfortable position on the couch; whether he had moved that way himself or had been moved, he didn't know. There was also a blanket draped over him, something he _knew_ he hadn't fallen asleep with.

His left hand came up, blearily rubbing at his eyes. Another dream about Bastila. Strange. But the way she had spoken to that Revan figure, and the tear, was far more strange than the dream itself.

He sat up and yawned loudly, drawing the attention of the only other occupant in the room.

"You're a restless sleeper," Bastila told him, looking over from the small table.

He looked in her direction, and immediately noticed a difference about her. She actually had real clothes on. The clothing was similar to that which she was wearing in his dream, but instead of brown and beige colors, her current attire was teal and silver mesh, with metal accoutrements adorning it. He raised an eyebrow, appreciative of her clothing choices, but said nothing about that.

Instead, he asked, "What was Revan to you?"

Her eyes widened, caught off-guard by his question. "Revan? He was a great Jedi, until he turned against the Order, fell to the dark side, and became Dark Lord of the Sith."

"But that's not what he _was_ to you," the commando pressed, knowing that she was evading the question.

She paled considerably, looked down into the cup she cradled between her hands. For a while, it didn't look like she was going to answer. Then she said, almost whispering, "I loved Revan. He had such charisma, such a presence, that you could not help but to be drawn to him. But for me, it was more. I knew since I was young that he held my heart spell-bound, and that he loved me as well." Her hands tightened on the cup, her knuckles turning white.

"So when he turned, his betrayal was all the more personal to you," Kagi said quietly.

She looked up at him, eyes wide, tears staining her cheeks. When he saw them, he looked away, mentally kicking himself.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to upset you," he said.

"You didn't know," she said kindly, forcing a smile. "May I ask why you wanted to know about that?"

"I had a dream," he replied. "More like a vision. I saw you, fighting against dark Jedi. And then a cloaked man, Revan I guess. But the way you spoke to him, I could sense that there was a more personal stake for you."

She went very quiet, turning her eyes back to her cup. It appeared as if she was going to swear. She looked at him again. "That is strange," she mused, staring distantly at the table. "Such visions are usually a sign of Force sensitivity."

He gave her a look that told her, in no uncertain words, that he thought she was full of bantha poodoo. "So you think I'm Force sensitive? What? A Jedi candidate?"

She frowned slightly, her brow furrowing in deep thought. "I… am not sure," she replied hesitantly. "It may be that you have some connection to the Force. It would not be unheard of. When we first met, your natural talent may have fed off my own Force abilities. It is possible that in the excitement of the battle's aftermath, the Force allowed you to witness one of my more intense memories."

"Intense," he mused. "The man you loved died." He winced suddenly. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to–"

Her movements stiffening, she waved it off nonchalantly. "What is past is past," she said. "Any pain the memory may bring me is my own fault, my inability to come to terms with the way I felt toward him."

Hastily changing the subject, he said, "It's not the first vision I've had."

"The Force is complicated," she replied, glad to be off that particular subject. "Even I don't yet understand it fully. This is a matter best left to the Council. If you wish, we can seek their judgment once we escape Taris."

He nodded once. "I would like that."

She smiled faintly. "Then as soon as we are off Taris, we shall go to the Jedi Enclave. I promise you."

Before he could reply, the door of the apartment slid open, admitting Carth, Mission, and Zaalbar. "Where have you guys _been_?" Carth asked, dropping his gear on the floor. "We've been looking for you in the Lower City for hours."

Kagi shrugged helplessly.

The pilot shook his head. "No matter. Now that we've got things sorted out, we just need to figure out a way to get off this planet."

As Bastila began to reply, Kagi looked toward her, and was shocked at the complete change in her posture and expression. She had been open and warm to him a moment ago, but now she seemed…distant. "You mean you don't have a plan to get off Taris yet?" she asked, her tone colder than a block of carbonite. "What have you been _doing_ this whole time?"

"We were trying to find _you_, Commander," Kagi replied, the change in his own tone a subtle hint that he didn't appreciate the change in her attitude.

For their part, Mission and Zaalbar quietly snuck away from the confrontation, making their way to the kitchen area and scrounging around quietly for something to eat.

"I see," Bastila said, either ignoring or oblivious to his tone. "Now that I'm back in charge of this mission, perhaps we can start doing things properly. Hopefully our escape from Taris will go more smoothly than when you 'rescued' me from Brejik."

A snarl curling his lip, the commando stood to his full height, fire burning in his eyes. Before he could say or do anything, Carth interposed his body directly between them.

"Commander, I know you're new at this," he said, trying to prevent a fight, "but a leader shouldn't berate her troops just because things aren't going as planned. Don't let your ego get in the way of the real issues here."

"That hardly strikes me as an appropriate way to address your commander, Carth," she spat, as though his name were a poison. "I am a member of the Jedi Order and this is my mission. Don't forget that."

Kagi laughed, the harsh sound resonating in the room. "Jedi, huh? If all the Jedi are as pompous and arrogant as you are, then I'm not surprised Revan turned on you. Hell, I'm surprised he didn't do it _sooner_."

Pain flashed in her eyes, and she physically winced. "I…"

Sensing she was vulnerable, Kagi stepped around Carth and gently laid a hand on her shoulder. He didn't miss the fact that she flinched at his touch. "Just settle down," he told her, keeping his voice soothing and calming. "We're only trying to help you here. Let me tell you a secret. The true mark of a leader is not something that can be taught in any school or institution, even by the Jedi. A true leader cares for those she leads, and knows how to listen when she needs to."

She nodded slowly, her face flushed with shame. Despite himself, Carth was surprised that the commando could have that much of an effect on her. Mission and Zaalbar hadn't missed it, either.

"I don't have much military experience," she said, her voice filled with revulsion at the way she had been acting. "I should not be so quick to judge." She turned her eyes up toward Kagi and Carth, her resolve steeled once more, but this time in the proper direction. "What do the two of you suggest?"

"We can't get hung up on who's in charge, first off," Carth replied. He glanced back at Mission and Zaalbar before continuing, "We _all_ need to work together if we want to get off this rock. The answer's out there, we just need to find it."

She nodded, then looked at Kagi. "And you?" she asked, her voice noticeably softer.

"Pretty much what he said," the commando replied with a shrug. "If we start getting into power battles, we may as well just hang it up."

She nodded again. "Well said. The sooner we start looking, the better. I've already been a prisoner of the Vulkars, and I don't plan on being captured by the Sith."

Kagi snorted and pointed to her lightsaber. "Just keep that light stick handy and you won't have to worry about it."

She gave him a short laugh, then said, "We're going to need some help getting off Taris. "Maybe if we ask around, one of the locals can help us out. We should probably start by asking around in the cantinas."

Kagi nodded, then turned to Mission and Zaalbar. "Can I trouble you guys to go dig up some knowledge in the cantina in the Lower City? You guys know that area better than us."

The Twi'lek girl nodded, finishing up a ration pack she had snuck from Kagi's pack. "You can count on us. We'll go see what we can find. Come on, Big Z."

The Wookie grumbled and, hoarding an armful of food he had taken from the Hidden Beks' base, followed her out.

"Carth, can I ask you to ask around the cantina on this level?" Bastila asked the pilot. "I'm afraid I don't know this place as well as you and Kagi do."

"I'm on it," he replied, following the earlier pair's exit vector.

That left the Jedi and the commando.

Kagi cleared his throat uncomfortably, breaking a long silence, then moved across the room to retrieve his boots. "I guess I'll wander around the apartment area," he told her, strapping on his boots. "You going to come with, or will you stay here?"

"No, I'll join you," she replied. "The forced inactivity would drive me out of my mind."

He raised an eyebrow. "Don't you Jedi meditate or something like that?"

"To tell you the truth," she said conspiratorially, "I never have been very good at meditating when there was action to be had."

"Ah," he said, crossing the room to retrieve his pack and blaster rifle. Then he triggered open the doors of the apartment. "Well then, shall we, Commander?"

She smiled ruefully. "Please, don't call me by a rank I haven't earned. Use my name."

He nodded. "As you wish, Bastila."

The pair exited the apartment, walking around the curved corridor toward the exit. As they passed the apartment next to theirs, they heard the sound of conflict from within.

"Wait," Bastila said, catching his right arm. "There's a fight going on in there."

He stopped, turned back, and keyed the access panel. "It's locked," he growled, inspecting the door. Then he paused, and looked toward her. "Can I borrow that lightsaber for a second?"

"Why?" she asked hesitantly, but handed the weapon over.

"Watch."

Thumbing on one of the glowing yellow blades, he drove the energy blade through the door, then slid it up, marched to the right, and back down again, cutting the rough shape of a smaller door large enough for them to pass through. Once he had finished cutting, he deactivated the lightsaber and handed it back, then braced himself and drove his right boot hard into the center of the outline, kicking in the impromptu door.

Inside, a couple of thugs were looking his way, quaking in fear, doubtless due to the fact that he had used the lightsaber to fight his way in. He calmly leveled his blaster rifle at them.

"You, the door, two minutes ago," he stated simply.

Without further argument, the thugs beat a hasty retreat. The woman they had been harassing looked at him, and Bastila walking in behind him, with a mix of awe and trepidation.

"Who are you?" she asked.

"Just a couple of spacers," Kagi replied. "Any reason those thugs were giving you trouble?"

"I…I don't want to talk about it," she said.

He raised an eyebrow. "Afraid of reprisal? I'm pretty sure that the two of us…" He gestured at Bastila and himself. "…could handle the problem."

The woman hesitated, clearly torn. Then she sighed and nodded. "I'm in trouble with Hodan, one of Davik's men who can't keep his hands to himself. But all he got for his trouble was a nasty scar. Too bad _I'm_ the one still paying the price."

"So he paid those thugs to put a squeeze on you?"

"Worse than that," she said. "He put a _bounty_ on my head."

"A bounty?" Bastila repeated, clearly disgusted. "Over a mere act of self-defense? What is this galaxy coming to?"

"A good question, that is," the woman replied. "I doubt there's anything either of you can do. When you work for the local crime lord, the authorities tend to turn a blind eye. I'm afraid this is between me and Hodan now."

"I'll see about speaking to him for you," Kagi said. "What's your name?"

"Dia," she answered hesitantly, closely scrutinizing this stranger who would help her for no reward. "He usually hangs out in the cantina in the Lower City."

"I'll see what I can do," he told her, then turned and left her apartment.

"Lower City cantina," Bastila mused as they continued on their way toward the exit. "Do you have any way of contacting Mission and Zaalbar, to see if they can handle this for us?"

He shook his head slowly. "No, we'll have to wander down there ourselves, eventually." As they kept walking, he could feel her eyes on him. Smirking slightly, though she couldn't see it, he asked back to her, "Is there something you want to talk about?"

"Yes," she replied, the surprised tone in her voice telling him that she hadn't expected him to know she was curious. "What happened after you and Carth crashed on Taris, before we all joined forces?"

"Looking for you, mostly," he replied, holding his blaster rifle over his shoulder. "We had to go through an awful lot of trouble before we managed to find you."

"So I've heard. But surely there was more than a simple search involved? I doubt there were flashing signs pointing in my direction."

He chuckled. "That would have been funny," he interrupted.

She paused, reflected on what she'd said, then laughed as well, a light, almost musical sound that was pleasant to his ears. "Yes, yes, it would have been." She continued to smile as she said, "But you also managed to avoid the Sith, discover that the Vulkars held me prisoner, gain sponsorship for the swoop race, and become the Taris swoop champion. Quite an impressive resume."

Beneath her words, he could sense an underlying respect and, albeit a tiny amount, admiration in her voice as she said that. He grinned to himself. "What can I say? I'm a pretty talented guy."

"Yes, I can see you do not lack in ability, but modesty is another matter," she said. Though her words were mocking, he could hear the smile in her voice, and knew that she meant no real harm with her statement. Then, suddenly, her tone became serious. "I doubt anyone expected this much from you when you were assigned to my mission. A Jedi could have done such things, of course, but not without drawing heavily upon the Force."

As he looked at her, walking beside him, he raised an eyebrow. "So you really think I'm Jedi material, don't you?"

At first, she looked at him as though she was about to spout off more meaningless wisdom, then she relented and nodded. "I do. You have a remarkable amount of Force ability within you, such that it's amazing you weren't discovered and trained before." She shook her head slowly. "But the Council does not usually take anyone older than a child for training. I do not think they would train you."

"You sound disappointed."

She sighed. "A little, yes. You have such potential; it's a shame to think that it might be wasted."

"I don't think my 'potential' has anything to do with it," he said, grinning.

"And just what are you…" She looked up at him, caught sight of his grin, and narrowed her eyes fiercely. "Get that thought _out_ of your head!" she spat, shoving him to the side. "I assure you, my interest in you is purely platonic."

He laughed, putting his hands out to keep him from slamming into the wall. "So you are interested!"

She growled, suddenly realizing that he was baiting her. Smirking, she decided to play his game. "Of course not," she responded. "You're not my type." Then she increased her pace, leaving him staring at her eminently-watchable backside.

"We'll see about that," he said to himself, chuckling.

---

In the Upper City cantina, Carth took a seat at an empty table, a bottle of fine Corellian whiskey in one hand, and a shot glass in the other. Just as he finished pouring his shot glass full of whiskey, a woman seated herself at the table across from him.

"Hey there," she all but purred at him. "Haven't seen you before. Of course, they don't give us officers much time off from the base."

The pilot's blood ran cold, but at the same time, he couldn't help but laugh at the irony of the situation. Here he was, stranded Republic pilot on a backwater Rim world with no hope of escape, getting propositioned by an enemy officer. "You're a Sith?" he ventured cautiously. "You don't look it."

The woman smiled coyly. "I'm off duty. I don't wear my uniform when I want to relax; nobody would speak to me. You'd be surprised at the power a set of armor can wield."

_Oh, I think I have an idea,_ Carth thought, downing the contents of his shot glass.

She gave him an evaluative stare, her mouth curling into a predatory smile. "Speaking of, I'm surprised that you're still talking to me. I'd expected you to have moved to a different table by now."

Carth shrugged off-hand. "You're just doing your job, right? I don't hold that against you." _I'd like to hold my blaster against you, though. Exercise some of that 'diplomacy' we learned about at the hands of you Sith monsters._

She smiled again. "You know, you're not half-bad. Me and a couple of the boys from the base are going to have a party later on. Perhaps you'd be interested…"

"Hey, hey, hey," a familiar voice called out, cutting through the din of the cantina. "What's going on here?"

Both Carth and the woman looked up to see Kagi and Bastila approaching through the crowd. As they reached the table, Kagi crossed his arms as he raised an eyebrow at Carth, grinning infuriatingly all the while.

"By the Force, Carth. Are you trying to _get cozy_ with someone? Wouldn't that require trust first?"

The woman glared daggers at the commando. "Ex_cuse_ me. I don't think you quite know who you're messing with. You wouldn't want to piss off a Sith officer, would you?"

At this, Kagi laughed aloud. "A Sith? Carth, you sure know how to pick 'em!" He doubled over, crossing his arms over his stomach as he fought to contain the laughter.

As he did so, the woman got a good look at Bastila standing behind him, and shot to her feet. "You!" she hissed, pointing at the young Jedi. "Don't move, Jedi! I'm taking you in, dead or alive."

The woman began to advance toward Bastila, but Kagi suddenly stood upright again, his face completely devoid of any emotion. More importantly, he held his vibroblade in his right hand, the point of the weapon pressing against the Sith woman's throat.

"I strongly recommend you reconsider that course of action," he said, deadpan. "It wouldn't do to gut your pretty little carcass in the middle of a well-to-do cantina, now would it?"

The woman glared lasers at him, and in response he dug his weapon into her neck a little bit deeper. She hissed, then raised her hands and slowly backed up, away from him. "Fine," she said. "You win this one, Republic. But know that we'll be back, and next time, you'll need more than that fancy letter-opener to stop us from taking your harlot's head."

As the Sith walked toward the exit, Kagi turned to Carth, pointing his thumb at the retreating figure. "Did she really just say that?" he asked. "I mean, I've blown some charges in my face and my hearing might be going… Did she really just call Bastila a harlot?"

Carth nodded slowly.

"Yeah, I thought so."

With that, Kagi tossed his vibroblade into the air, neatly catching it by its sharp point, and then spun, flinging his arm out in the direction of the Sith woman. Startled patrons ducked from his sudden movement, but the vibroblade sailed straight and true, driving right into the woman's back. He could tell immediately by the depth of the penetration that it slipped between her ribs, spine, and shoulder blade to hit something vital. She was dead before she hit the floor.

Whistling a little ditty, nodding to a nearby patron, the commando serenely strode over to the corpse, plucking his vibroblade from the dead woman's back. He knelt down beside her, using her tunic to wipe the blood from his weapon, before he slipped it back into his boot sheath.

Behind him, Bastila regarded him with a mix of awe and fear. She knew without having to be told that her cheeks were as red as a blaster bolt. She had just watched the man kill someone in cold blood over something as petty as a minor insult against her.

_His knife throwing skills have not depreciated at all,_ she caught herself thinking admiringly. She shook her head once to clear those thoughts, and when she opened her eyes, she found herself staring at his amused face.

"Surely you're not unused to your suitors killing for you?" he quipped, grinning infuriatingly.

She only blushed harder.

---

As the trio left the cantina, a green-skinned male Twi'lek whistled to draw their attention. "You there, human," the Twi'lek said, looking pointedly at Kagi. "You are the rider who won the great swoop race in the Lower City, yes?"

Looking around uneasily, the commando shifted his shoulders, then approached the alien. "What of it?"

"I have a message from Canderous Ordo. He says to meet him in the cantina."

Kagi gave the Twi'lek a look that could have melted durasteel. "We just _came_ from the cantina."

The Twi'lek shook his head once, his _lekku_ mystically staying in place. "The Mandalorian waits in the Lower City."

Taking his time, Kagi looked to Carth. The pilot shrugged. He then turned to Bastila. Her expression told him, 'We might as well.'

Shrugging as well, Kagi turned back to the Twi'lek. "Alright, we'll play along."

"Wise choice, human. I would advise you not to wait too long. Mandalorians are known for many things, but patience is not one of them."

After the Twi'lek had vanished and the three were on their way, Carth suddenly spoke up. "Bastila, I was wondering something. How did the Vulkars manage to catch a famous Jedi like you? Were you knocked out when your escape pod crashed?"

"N-no," she replied hesitantly. "I was conscious. But my Force powers were exhausted from using my Battle Meditation in the battle for the _Endar Spire_. Without my help, you might have never gotten off the ship alive."

At the front of the group, Kagi sighed and shook his head theatrically, muttering, "Here we go again…"

Not having heard their comrade, Carth nodded to her. "Fair enough. But I've seen you Jedi in action. There's no way those thugs would've stood a chance against your lightsaber."

She stopped suddenly, drawing their progression to a halt. Color rose in her face. "My lightsaber was…misplaced…" she said ashamedly, running her fingers along the weapon on her belt. "I couldn't find it after the crash. The Vulkars overwhelmed me as I was looking for it."

"Wait a minute," Carth said, his expression disbelieving. "You _lost_ your lightsaber?" He laughed. "Isn't that a violation of the Jedi Code or something?"

Her only response was to blush even harder, lowering her head in shame as her hands clenched into fists.

Kagi walked back up to them, planting himself directly behind Bastila, so close that she could feel his body heat radiating out of him. "Leave her alone, Carth," he said dangerously. "You want respect from her? How about showing her some in return?"

That rattled around the dust inside the pilot's head. He looked away for a moment, not seeing as Bastila turned her head toward the commando and mouthed "Thank you."

Smiling, Kagi patted her reassuringly on the shoulder, then waited for the pilot to reply.

"I'm sorry," he finally muttered. "You're right, Kagi. It's just…funny to think of a legendary Jedi losing her lightsaber." He snickered to himself. "Might want to leave that detail out of the history archives."

"What about _you_ then, eh, Carth?" Kagi asked, crossing his arms. "You think it was fun picking on Bastila? Fine. _Your_ turn."

The pilot paled, turning away. "Well, I guess I _did_ say you could ask me more questions later. Is this really necessary?"

"Very much so."

"Well, fine." He chuckled. "Go ahead, interrogate me."

"Wonderful," Kagi replied, grinning. "Soon, your secrets shall all be mine!"

Carth shrugged. "All my secrets are purely of the mundane variety, unfortunately. Nothing worth extracting, but you're welcome to try." He held up a hand. "But first, I'd like to ask you a question. I've been going through the battle on the _Endar Spire_ in my head and some things just don't add up. Maybe you could tell me what happened, from your perspective of course."

The commando shrugged. "I wasn't really in much of a position to see anything of importance. We came, they saw, we got owned like the British."

"The who?" Bastila asked, her eyebrow raised questioningly.

Kagi thought about it, then shrugged. "No idea, really. Just sounded good. Hey, help me spread it around, maybe we can get a catch phrase going." He chuckled, then turned back to Carth. "Really though, I don't know."

"And neither was I, to tell the truth," the pilot said with a nod. "I was on board as an advisor. The battle happened so fast, that it's anybody's guess what actually happened. We lost a lot of good people, and for what? The hope that Jedi powers would save us, somehow. It's not like Bastila had any opportunity to act."

Sensing another round of bickering, Kagi stepped directly between them, pushing his arms out toward them as far as they would go, forcing them to step back or eat his hands. "Not happening," he warned. He turned to Carth. "We didn't chose that battle, Carth. It got forced on us."

Not wishing to get on the commando's bad side again, Carth nodded agreeably. "Come to think of it, it's more than a little surprising that you happen to be here, isn't it? Just what is your position with the Republic fleet anyway?"

"We've been over this, Carth," Kagi replied, sighing theatrically. "I'm a SpecForces commando assigned as Bastila's personal bodyguard. Anything wrong with that?"

"Hell no," Carth replied. "With a man of your skills as her bodyguard, I pity the Sith that try to kill her. It's just that you have to consider you were a last-minute addition to the crew roster and you just _happen_ to be one of the survivors."

The commando raised an eyebrow, and something dangerous flashed in his eyes. "Would you rather I hadn't?"

"Don't be ridiculous," the pilot replied, waving that idea off. "You've more than proved yourself since the crash. We wouldn't have made it this far without your skills. But still…"

"Oh, I get it. You're insinuating that _I_ had something to do with the crash."

There was a long pause, then Carth shrugged. "Maybe. Don't get me wrong. It just seems odd that someone Bastila specifically requested to transfer aboard happened to survive."

Kagi knew the entire time that it had been her request to add him to the roster, but he couldn't stop himself from turning slightly to grin knowingly back at her. She blushed, and slammed her open palm against his back.

"Ooh," he said, squirming slightly. "That felt good. Do it again."

This time, she connected with the back of his head.

"Considering your connection to Bastila and the Jedi," Carth said loudly, trying to quell any potential violence, "your presence here seems a little convenient." He shrugged after getting the commando's attention back. "Of course, I'm probably wrong and this is probably nothing. But I learned a long time ago not to take anything at face value. And I _hate_ surprises."

Kagi sighed, exchanging a knowing glance with Bastila. Getting anywhere with this damnable pilot was like pulling teeth from a rancor. "Define surprises," he said.

"You know, expect the unexpected." Carth shrugged again. "Just to be safe."

"Okay, you do know we're all on the same side, right?" Kagi asked, his voice that of an instructor trying to teach exceptionally slow pupils.

Bristling, Carth hissed through clenched teeth, "Look, it has nothing to do with you personally. I don't trust anyone, and I have my reasons." Before either of his comrades could say anything, he held up a finger to silence them. "And _no_, I'm not going to discuss them! So can we just keep our minds on more important things?"

Stepping up beside the commando, Bastila crossed her arms imperiously. "This _is_ important."

Following her lead, Kagi also crossed his arms, nodding sagely. "What she said."

Carth shook his head irritably. "Alright, alright! You two are pretty damn tenacious, you know that?" He sighed. "Alright, we'll talk about it. But _later_. Right now, I just want to get going."

Both Kagi and Bastila sensed they weren't going to get anything more out of him. Exchanging a glance, they shrugged at one another, then continued on.

After a few moments, Kagi suddenly said, "You know guys, we really need a new hobby…"


	9. The Great Raid

"I saw you in the swoop race. Very impressive. You seem like you know how to get results. That's just the kind of person I'm looking for."

Kagi narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the figure seated across the table from him. The man was a born soldier; there was no mistaking the hard lines under his eyes, the creases in his hands as he grasped the tall glass of some unnamed liquor and bolted it down.

On Kagi's left, Carth watched the Mandalorian suspiciously, barely touching the Corellian brandy in front of him. To Kagi's right, Bastila's expression was that of curiosity as she sipped at a very, very light Alderaanian ale.

For his part, Kagi bolted down a shot glass full of Whyren's Reserve, a brand-new whiskey from Corellia that was all the rage in the Core Worlds. "To what do we owe the pleasure of this meeting, Mister…"

"Ordo," the Mandalorian supplied. "Canderous Ordo. I work for Davik Kang and the Exchange." He shrugged his broad shoulders. "The hours aren't great, but they promised me a fortune for them and I have nothing better to do. Mandalorian mercs like me are in high demand."

The man paused long enough to take another pull of his drink, then continued, "But lately Davik hasn't been paying me what he promised. I don't like getting cheated, so I figure it's time for me to break the Sith quarantine and get off this backwater planet."

The three Republic fighters exchanged a glance. "Why tell us this?"

Canderous leaned forward, lowering his voice considerably, yet not quite whispering. "I've got a plan to get off Taris," he said, "but I can't do it alone. I need someone I know can get the job done to help me. That's where you come on."

Bastila leaned close in on Kagi's right side, so close that he could feel her breath on his ear. He suppressed a shiver at her proximity as she whispered, "We don't need to ally ourselves with this…person." At that, she spared a none-too-pleasant glance at the Mandalorian, before turning back to Kagi, her voice considerably softening. "We should leave while we can."

"I ain't talking to you," Canderous snapped at her, regardless of not having heard what she said. "I'm talking to your friend, aren't I?"

The commando's shot glass hit the table's surface hard enough to cause the other glasses on the table to jump. "Watch your tone," he said, a dangerous tone in his voice. "You want my help, and talking down to her is no way to get it."

Beside him, Bastila fought to control her surprise. She only partially succeeded; her eyes widened considerably. This was twice that he had come to her defense. A momentary tremor of fear shot through her as the thought struck her that _his_ protectiveness of her was beginning to surface, and the rest of _him_ could easily follow.

But just as quickly, that fear was drowned out by the elation that he _had_ defended her.

On her right, the Mandalorian shrugged slightly, then changed the subject. "I saw you win that swoop race and I started thinking, 'Anyone crazy enough to race like that is probably crazy enough to break into the Sith base.'"

"WHAT?" Carth blurted, his outburst pulling Bastila out of her internal musings, and drawing the attention of other cantina patrons.

Kagi and Canderous both shot the pilot a withering glare.

"Yes!" Bastila said suddenly, loud enough for the patrons to hear. "That's how you tell that a bantha is pregnant!"

Scattered laughter met that statement and the patrons who had been drawn by Carth's outburst turned away, satisfied that they'd only listened in on the butt end of a joke amongst friends.

Canderous turned an appreciative look on Bastila. "Not bad," he said, smirking.

She paid him no mind. She sank down into her seat, color rising to her face. "I… can't believe… I did that…" she said.

Kagi smirked at her. "You did good, Bastila," he told her.

She looked at him, saw the smirk he was giving her, and her heart skipped a beat. She had seen that smirk before, _long_ ago. Back before the handful of dissentious Jedi had joined the Mandalorian Wars. It was a smirk that carried a hidden meaning. To Carth and Canderous, they saw it as condescending, perhaps amused. Bastila knew it was a private smirk, the meaning of which was only known to her.

What _scared_ her about it was that it wasn't a smirk that Kagi had perfected. He probably wasn't even aware of its meaning, of the fact that it made her heart pound from more than just fear.

"Why exactly would we want to break into the Sith base for you?" the commando asked, noting Bastila's sudden silence for the second time.

"I need someone to steal the Sith launch codes," Canderous replied, his expression suggesting that it was common knowledge. "Without those codes, any ship leaving the atmosphere will be disintegrated by the Sith fleet's automated defense guns."

Once more, Kagi exchanged a glance with his comrades. "So let's assume we get you these launch codes," he said. "We cheerfully hand over the datapad to you, and what do we get in return? A blaster bolt each, perhaps? Or maybe you'll just leave us high and dry while you get away in whatever ship you've got stashed away."

The mercenary laughed aloud, leaning back in his chair. Fewer patrons looked over this time. After a moment, he composed himself. "No, here's the deal," he said. "You bring me those launch codes, and I'll provide you with a ride on my getaway vehicle, Davik's own _Ebon Hawk_."

"There's more than just the three of us," Kagi said without a hitch. "A Wookiee and a Twi'lek get passage too, or no deal."

"Fine, fine," Canderous replied. "Good luck, though. You'll need it. The entrance is sealed tight, and getting in won't be easy. The base is protected by an encrypted security system that it would take a top of the line astromech to slice through."

"We have a door-opener," the commando said smoothly, leaving the reference to Bastila's lightsaber unspoken.

The Mandalorian was nothing if not quick-witted. "Lightsaber won't do it. The door has cortosis-weave inlaid into the lock." He offered up a dry smirk to Bastila. "You'll have to do it the old-fashioned way. Luckily, I know just the place to get a droid. Davik was having one custom-built by Janice Nall. Just tell her that I sent you and she should give you the droid for a reasonable price. Then you use it to open the Sith base and get the codes."

"You obviously planned this well out," Bastila said. "Why don't you get the codes yourself?"

"Everyone knows who I work for, lady," he replied, his tone sharp. "If I broke into the base, the entire Sith garrison would drop onto Davik's head in a heartbeat looking for those codes. So that's what you're here for."

Nodding, Kagi finished off the last of his Whyren's Reserve. "Okay, Canderous. We'll get those codes for you."

The three of them stood up from the table and moved away. "Are you sure about this?" Carth asked. "For all we know, he'll stab us in the back the moment we hand him those codes."

Bastila shook her head. "I sensed no deception from him," she said, surprise in her voice. "No, I think this is exactly what we need."

Carth looked at her skeptically, then shrugged. "Okay then, let's get on with it."

"Wait," Kagi said, putting his hand on Carth's shoulder. He turned to Bastila. "Didn't Dia say that Holdan frequented this cantina?"

She paused for a moment, then nodded. "I had almost forgotten."

"Buy yourself another drink, Carth," Kagi said, turning away from the exit. "We won't be long."

With that, the pair turned and strode past the table where they had made their plans with Canderous, ignoring the Mandalorian's raised eyebrow, and entered the next alcove, taken up at the fair end by a stage upon which a handful of female Twi'leks were dancing, to the amusement of the crowd around them.

As the two of them stood there, a partially-drunk man stumbled, right into Kagi. The commando quickly stepped back on his right leg and braced his weight against it, remaining upright.

"Sorry," the man said, regaining his upright position. "Guess I had a little too much to drink. And my attention was kinda focused on those dancers. Look at them waggle those head-tails."

Kagi glanced at Bastila just in time to see her wiping away a smirk at the situation he found himself in. He shot her a look, then turned back to the man, who was still rambling.

"I don't normally go for those alien girls, but I've had some bad experiences with my own species lately. Maybe it's time for a change, you know what I mean?"

"I can see why," Bastila muttered under her breath.

The commando nudged her with his elbow, then said to the man, "Your love life doesn't really concern me. At all."

The man narrowed his eyes and drew himself up, attempting to intimidate the commando. He failed. "I don't like your tone," he said matter-of-factly. "I work for Davik Kang, and I'm used to people treating me with respect."

"That sounds like a personal problem to me," Kagi said flatly.

"This seems to be the right guy," Bastila said.

If the man heard her, he didn't show it. Just about to respond to her, Kagi paused. He hadn't seen her mouth move, and she had definitely spoken loud enough for the man to hear her, and he didn't seem like the type to let comments pass him by.

"You want to disrespect me, do you? I'll have a bounty on your head so fast you won't know what hit you!"

"You like putting out bounties, don't you?" Kagi asked. "Like the one you put on Dia, hm?"

"Oh, that wench that tried to cut me with her vibroblade, eh?" the man, Holdan, responded. "Yeah, I put that bounty on her. I can't let her–"

A bladelike motion of Kagi's hand interrupted him. "I don't want to hear it. I want that bounty gone."

"What?" Holdan shouted. "I can't do that; I've got a reputation to keep up." He paused, as if reconsidering. "Well…it would be a shame to kill such a good-looking gal. Tell you what. You give me two hundred credits and I'll have Zax take off that bounty."

"So you'd trade two hundred credits for your dignity?" Kagi asked.

"What're you talking about?" the criminal hissed.

"If you stick to having that bounty on her, it'll show you're not man enough to do it yourself," Kagi replied, as though reporting on the weather in the Undercity. "I don't know about Davik, but if _I_ was running an Exchange ring, I wouldn't want underlings who couldn't handle their own problems…"

Holdan looked shaken by the commando's words. "Hey, y-you're right. When you put it that way, I definitely should take that bounty off. Besides, I've noticed some of the girls around here have been–"

"Get rid of the bounty," Kagi said, an acid edge to his words.

"Right, right," Holdan said, paling considerably. "I'll go talk to Zax right now and get the bounty cleared up."

And then the man did just that.

"Impressive," Bastila said. "You managed to convince him to remove the bounty without resorting to threats or violence."

He raised an eyebrow. "Just because I'm a soldier doesn't mean I like to kill senselessly."

She smiled. "Good."

"That guy would've been a waste of my time anyway," he said with a smirk.

For a moment, she regarded him with shock. Then she realized that the smirk was meant to parlay the statement as a joke. She sighed theatrically. "Whatever shall I do with you, Commando?"

He grinned. "You'll just have to send me back to whatever facility the Republic uses to stamp out its forces," he joked. "I'm obviously defective." He sobered. "Well, let's go get Carth and break some Sith heads."

As the commando passed her, her smile faltered. _No factory could stamp you out like a machine,_ she thought. _And whatever defects you have mean nothing to me…_

---

They met up with Mission and Zaalbar shortly out of the elevator in the Upper City.

"Where have you guys _been_?" Mission cried, waving her arms theatrically.

"We found transport off the planet," Kagi replied, moving the group away from the elevator.

Once they were well away from any Sith patrols, Mission turned to the commando, hopping from foot to foot excitedly. "So where is it? Let's get out of here!"

"Well, it's not that simple," Carth told her. "There's something we've got to do first."

"We have to break into the Sith base and steal their launch codes," Kagi said, not mincing any words.

The Twi'lek couldn't have looked more shocked. "Say what?"

He shrugged. "Part of the deal. We get the codes, Canderous Ordo provides us the ship."

"That…that's nuts, you know," she stammered. "You guys aren't going to come out of there. The place is crawling with Sith."

"We can handle them, Mission," Zaalbar growled in his language.

Kagi looked up at the furry figure and smirked. "I figured you wouldn't let me go in there without you," he said.

"Of course not," Zaalbar replied. "I have pledged a life debt to you. It would forever shame me if I did not do everything I could to keep you alive."

"If Big Z's going with you," Mission said, "then I'm going, too."

"Mission…" Kagi began.

"No!" she cut him off. "You're not cutting me out of this. I can handle myself. And I already told you that I'm not going to risk losing Big Z again."

For a moment, he was going to argue. But then Bastila laid her hand on his shoulder and shook her head slowly. He sighed, then nodded. "Okay, Mission, you can come with us."

She grinned. "So what are we waiting for?"

"We need to buy an astromech droid that could slice the base's security system for us," Bastila replied.

"You and Zaalbar wait for us by the base," Kagi said. "We'll get the droid and meet you there."

"You got it," she replied with a nod. "Come on, Big Z, let's go."

The pair made their way back toward the elevator, and the Sith base beyond. The remaining trio looked around the plaza.

"Where's the droid shop?" Carth asked.

Kagi pointed to the building right in front of them. "Probably that one. It's about the only one we didn't go in."

Carth nodded, and the trio approached the building. As they walked toward it, Carth looked over at Bastila again.

"Bastila, did you ever think about running off to join all the other Jedi who followed Revan and Malak when they went to fight the Mandalorians?" he asked.

She hesitated, her pause once more drawing the group to a halt. As Kagi turned a curious expression toward her, she quickly turned her back to him. In truth, she hadn't cared about the war or the Council's order that no Jedi enter the war. She had only wanted to be by _his_ side, but he had left without telling her, without giving her the chance to join him.

"That was nearly five years ago," she replied hesitantly, her mind working overtime to try and figure a way out of this situation. "I was still an apprentice. My Battle Meditation hadn't even manifested yet." She paused, knowing that there was no way she could reveal the truth. Sighing, she lied, "Even then, I had enough wisdom to obey the will of the Council. Unlike Revan."

The words stung her, causing her to wince almost imperceptibly. She tried to hope that Kagi wouldn't catch it, but she knew it was a futile hope.

"I guess," Carth said with a shrug, oblivious to it all. "Still, do you ever wonder if things could have been different? Would Revan and Malak still have corrupted if the Council had supported them instead of dragging its feet?"

Hot anger surged through her. In truth, it was because she often considered Revan's fall a failure on her part. That if she had been with him, he would not have turned.

She found herself hissing, "Do not blame Revan's corruption on the Council! Your Republic saw only the threat of the Mandalorians, but the wisdom of the Masters saw something beyond the immediate threat."

Kagi noted all-too-acutely that she had not mentioned Malak once, but decided to spare her any questions that would agitate the pain of the man she loved dying in front of her. Instead, he asked, "What did they see?"

"There was something lurking out there," she replied, her tone softening almost immediately. "Something that devoured Revan and Malak. Had the Council sent us all to investigate, how many more would have been lost?"

The question was an academic one to her, and had no meaning. She knew in a single, searing moment of insight that she would have gladly followed Revan down the dark path, and not thought another word of it.

"So you're saying we should have done nothing?" Carth asked. "Just let the Mandalorians conquer us unopposed? I mean, the Republic was under attack, and the Order _abandoned_ us!"

"We did not abandon you!" Bastila shot back. "But the Council was not about to throw lives away _foolishly_! In time, we would have aided you against the Mandalorians. But you couldn't wait." She turned her eyes to Kagi, and he caught a fleeting look behind them that he couldn't identify. "Revan and Malak offered a quick answer, and the Republic chose to walk the easy path rather than the path of wisdom. Now we see the results all around us."

She sighed, and looked back toward Carth. "You ask me if things could have been different. I _know_ they could have. If Revan had only listened to the Council…" _If he had only taken me with him._ "…millions of innocent people would still be alive."

"Yeah, right," Carth said, disgust evident in his voice. "And every single one of them would be speaking Mandalorian. I think we're done here. Let's just get back to the task at hand."

Kagi shook his head slowly. "What am I going to do with you two?"

Rather than watch them struggle to compose a reply, he crossed into the infrared sensor beam of the droid shop's doors, watching them slide open before him. Inside were all manner of plasteel cylinders and metal boxes, doubtless filled with droid parts. There were also several work tables with droid parts scattered across their surfaces, as well as three mostly-complete protocol droids against the far wall. To the right, near the counter, were two T3 model astromech droids. One was rust brown in color, and looked quite battered. In comparison, the other model, white, looked almost new.

"A customer?" a woman's voice called out in Basic, tonal inflections indicating that Basic was not the female's first language. "Come in, come in! Janice Nall at your service. Welcome to my droid and droid supply shop."

Kagi led his companions up to the counter, looking around at the shop as he did so. The woman behind the counter was a Twi'lek, and obviously well-versed in her trade, as the grease stains on her face and clothing testified.

"Always good to see a new face," she continued. "Customers are hard to come by. A lot of the Taris citizens won't even come in here. They refuse to shop at a store run by a Twi'lek."

"The anti-alien bias is that bad around here, eh?" Kagi asked her in her own language.

Her eyes widened in surprised pleasure. "You speak my language!" she said, reverting to her own tongue. Then she remembered his question, and her tone became bitter. "No, they don't like aliens in the Upper City. They tolerate Twi'leks, but they'd rather see us as dancers in the cantina than successful business owners."

"You would think people would be more tolerant of others in this day and age," Bastila said sadly. Unlike Carth, she understood the Twi'lek merchant language, which was the dialect that Kagi and Janice were speaking in. A momentary pang hit her upon the memory that it was Revan who had taught her the Twi'lek merchant language.

Carth shrugged in her direction. "I guess stupidity and ignorance will never go out of style."

Both Kagi and Bastila turned condescending expressions to the pilot, but said nothing.

"You'll see a few aliens around," Janice said, "but most of the non-humans stick to the Lower City. I've learned not to dwell on it, though. I try to stay focused on running my store." She put on a business smile, and reverted to speaking Basic. "My selection is limited since the Sith confiscated all my assault droids, but I've got a utility droid you might find interesting."

"Excellent," Kagi said, smiling pleasantly. "That's just what I've come to inquire about. Canderous Ordo sent me to pick up a droid."

"He did?" she asked. "It's about time he sent somebody; I've had his droid ready for him for a week. That'll be two thousand credits."

Kagi turned to Carth. The pilot shrugged neutrally. He glanced next to Bastila's also neutral expression, then turned around and fished a pair of one thousand credit chips out of his pocket, laying them on the counter.

"Here you go. The white one, right?"

"Yes, T3-M4," Janice replied, examining the credit chips. After determining they were authentic, she said, "A pleasure doing business with you."

"Come on, little guy," Kagi said to the astromech droid. "We've got work to do."

The astromech droid let out a series of whistles and beeps, then rolled forward to join the trio. Without another word, they all exited the shop, crossing the plaza again. They bypassed the elevator completely, continuing on the walkway toward the Sith base.

Once there, Mission and Zaalbar crept out of the shadow of a Sith interceptor landed nearby. Nodding to them, Kagi pointed T3 to the door.

"Okay, little fellow, get that door open for us."

Whistling happily, the astromech extended a combination computer probe and slicing tool, then set to work on the security while the others kept watch for any approaching Sith.

After a few moments, T3 hooted triumphantly and backed away as the blast door slid open. Tweeting happily, the astromech droid moved to the back of the formation that was assembling at the door, with Kagi and Bastila in the lead.

"Stick close to me," he told her, then advanced into the Sith base, blaster rifle primed.


	10. Infiltration

**A/N:** Sorry about the delay in getting this one out. I couldn't decide on what kind of background music I wanted for over a day, then it just sort of clicked together. My recommendation for exploring the Sith base is the Mako reactor theme from FF7, and the fight with the Sith governor is the Encounter theme from Metal Gear Solid. There's a not-so-subtle nod to Star Wars Republic Commando in here. Incidentally, one of the commandos in that game, Scorch, is voiced by the same guy who did Carth.

* * *

"Just take these credits and get out of here," Kagi told the Twi'lek receptionist. "It's about to get real messy in here, and you don't want to get caught in the middle of it."

"You got that right, stranger," she replied, pocketing the credits. "The Sith have been making my life a living hell since they got here. It's about time somebody stood up to them."

As the receptionist ran out the door they had opened, Mission vaulted over the desk and started hacking into the computer terminal. Kagi, Zaalbar, Bastila, and Carth formed themselves into a screen around the young girl, facing the three doors leading out of the room.

"Okay, this is looking bad," she said, flipping between security camera images. "We've got Sith and droids all over the place, plus one really _big_ droid guarding an elevator. Chances are that you'll have to take that elevator down to find the codes."

"Is there anything you can do to even the odds?" Bastila asked, looking over Mission's shoulder at the images.

"That depends."

"On what?" Carth asked, not taking his eyes off the eastern door.

"On how badly you want the Sith to know we're here. I can start blowing things up to lessen their numbers, but chances are I'll wake up a whole garrison doing that." She paused for a moment, her fingers running over the keypad, and then she called back, "There. I've uploaded a map of the base, so at least now you'll have some semblance of an idea where you're going."

"That's a start," Kagi said. "Anything else you can do?"

"Give me a second." Pause. "Okay, I _think_ I can remotely shut down all the turrets and droids from here without raising an alarm."

"Do it."

Her answer was silence for several moments as the room filled with the sounds of her fingers hitting the keys. Then, "Okay, got it. You won't have to worry about turrets or sentry droids. There's still the little matter of all the Sith running around, however…" She entered a few more commands. "Okay, I've shut down the shield on that big droid and opened the elevator doors, too. The droid itself must have an autonomous network; I can't shut it down from here."

"Excellent work, Mission," Kagi said, looking at the map on his datapad. "You've done more than I could have hoped for. You stay here and see what you can do to keep helping us. Zaalbar, T3, stay with her. The rest of us are going hunting."

"Got it," the Twi'lek girl replied, calling the astromech droid up beside her to help with slicing the system. She picked up a comlink from the desk and tossed it to the commando. "Here. I'll call you if I get anything."

"Thanks," he replied, palming the device. He approached the north door, Bastila and Carth in tow.

The door hissed open silently, revealing an empty corridor beyond. Waving his comrades forward, Kagi advanced into the corridor, his eyes shifting between the three doors before them. As soon as Bastila was through, the door hissed shut behind her.

"_The door on your left is the medical room,"_ Mission's voice called from the comlink. _"The next right is some kind of security center. Nothing to see there; I've remotely locked out that console from here. The door straight ahead of you leads to some sort of detention area. I don't _see_ any guards, but that's just all the more reason to be cautious."_

Moving slowly, Kagi advanced toward the far door, bypassing the others. As they neared the door, he flattened himself against the bulkhead. Carth immediately followed suit, and Bastila did the same shortly thereafter. Sidling up the side of the wall, Kagi slid his hand into the infrared sensor beam, triggering the door open. Two sentry droids were directly in front of them, but they were hunched over, deactivated. He ignored them.

Signaling for Bastila and Carth to stay put, he crept up to the very edge of the door. He saw no Sith on the west end of the room. Holding his breath, he listened for any activity on the side of the room he could not see, but heard only the hum of a force cage. He shifted his blaster rifle to his left hand and drew his vibroblade, poking it out gently around the corner and angling it until he could see what was on the other side of the room. He didn't see any Sith, so he sheathed his vibroblade and motioned the others forward, then stepped into the room.

Four force cages were lined up along the opposite wall, and the third contained a Duros. Narrowing his eyes, the commando approached the cage. There was something familiar about that Duros…

"You there, human," the alien said as he approached. "Remember me? You helped me once before when the Sith were trying to arrest me. Outside your apartment. Do you remember?"

"Yes, I thought you looked familiar," Kagi replied. "I suppose they caught up with you?"

The mournful-looking alien nodded. "Yes, they caught me moving the Sith corpse out of the apartment complex, and now they're going to execute me. Can you get me out of this cage?"

"Certainly. How do I do it?"

"Switch all the panels on that wall to the red 'off' position," the Duros answered, pointing to the opposite wall. "Of course, switching one panel will switch the two next to it."

Kagi scoffed. "I hate those kinds of puzzles."

"Me, too," the Duros agreed. "But this one has the highest stakes. If you accidentally switch them all to green, my cell's termination program will activate."

"Okay, just hang on," the commando said. "I'll get you out of there."

He turned around and approached the wall panels. There were five of them, and the first, third, and fifth were green. As he stared at the panels, he rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

"I do so hate these games," Bastila said, walking up beside him. "I never could solve one without making a mistake."

"Yeah, they're pretty tricky," Kagi replied absently. He pointed to the third panel. "If I flip _that_ one, the pattern will be green, green, red, green, green."

"Are you sure that's safe?" she asked. "One mistake will kill this poor Duros."

"I'm trying to think," he replied, holding up his left hand as though he was on the verge of an intellectual breakthrough. "Then I flip the _first_ panel and it'll be red, red, red, green, green."

"Then you flip the _last_ panel and they're all red," Bastila said, catching his line of thought. She smiled proudly at him. "Brilliant."

"Eh, not really," he replied, stepping forward to try and hide his suddenly-flushed face. "Back in commando school, all I ever saw in demolitions training was red and green. I can do most anything with those colors." He pressed the switch of the center panel, and the colors changed exactly how he had predicted.

Bastila watched silently as he confidently hit the first panel, the colors again following his predetermined statements. She stepped forward, taking it upon herself to switch off the last panel, causing all of the panels' lights to flash red. He glanced over at her, and she gave him a wry smirk.

Behind them, the force cage's energy field shut off, and the Duros stepped out of it. "Thank you again, human," he said. "I do not know what you are doing inside this military base, but I am grateful. Once again I owe you a debt I can never repay."

Kagi waved it off. "Do not trouble yourself with that, Friend Traveler," he replied. "Assisting you was payment enough."

"Kind words, Traveler," the Duros said. "It pleases me that there are those in the galaxy like you, who help others with no thought to themselves. Now, I will leave before the Sith catch me again. Good day, Traveler."

As the Duros left, Bastila turned a warm smile to Kagi. "That was very noble of you," she said. "Does your kindness know no bounds?"

"Only in regards to you," he replied with a grin. "I can't possibly come up with enough ways to infuriate you."

She raised an eyebrow. "Oh, you're trying to infuriate me, are you?" she asked, smirking. "If that is the case, then I suggest you try harder, Mister Vayun."

"Hey, if you two lovebirds are done, we've still got work to do here," Carth said, an amused tone in his voice.

Kagi turned a wry grin to the pilot. "Jealous, Carth?"

He laughed. "Don't be crazy."

The sudden grin that Kagi flashed him told him that he'd been caught in a trap. "So somebody would have to be crazy to like Bastila, eh?"

The Jedi raised an eyebrow, giving the two men a dangerous look. "Is _that_ so?"

"Hey, he said it, not me!" Carth said, holding his hands up placatingly.

"Wuss," Kagi said.

"Suck-up," the pilot shot back.

"Children," Bastila hissed. "Work now, petty insults later."

"Yes, Mother," Kagi said, then jumped forward out of the range of her open-palm slap. Snickering, the commando made his way to the westernmost door.

"_The command center and reactor area will be on your right as you make the corner,"_ Mission said over the comlink. _"A barracks will be on the left."_

"You think the codes will be in the command center?" Kagi asked.

"_I doubt it. I've sliced all the computers on this level, and there's nothing that even remotely resembles launch codes anywhere on the network."_

"Still, I say it'd be worth it to blow out their reactors," the commando said. "Put this base permanently out of commission."

"With us still inside it?" Bastila asked, horrified.

He shook his head. "No. I'll set up a remote detonator, and I won't blow it until we're well on our way off this planet."

"How exactly are you proposing to do this?" Carth asked. "Do we _have_ anything capable of putting a dent in those shielded reactors?"

"Well, no," the commando replied, shrugging slightly. "But being a military base, there might be something here we can use." He keyed the comlink. "Mission? Can you run me an inventory of the base, see if they have some large-scale explosives in an armory?"

"_Give me a sec,"_ the slicer said.

The three Republic fighters took up positions along the sides of the corridor as they waited, covering each others' backs. After only a few moments, the comlink chirped.

"_Okay, the door at the very end of the hall is the armory,"_ Mission informed them. _"Logistics manifests indicate that they're carrying a large supply of permacrete detonators and proton cores. Definitely stuff big enough to bring down this base."_

"Excellent," Kagi said, standing up and moving toward the door. "I'll take it all."

"_All_?" Carth repeated. "Isn't that a little much?"

"First thing you learn in SpecForces demolition training, Carth," he replied, trying to slice open the locked door. "Always use 'P' for plenty."

"Are you sure it's not 'P' for planeticide in this instance?" the pilot shot back.

"Ooh, nice one," Kagi said with a snicker. "Planeticide. I'll have to remember that."

Bastila shook her head. "Boys and their toys…"

After a few moments, Kagi swore and kicked the armory door. "Too secure," he pronounced. "I can't get it open."

"What about your demolitions bag of tricks?" Carth asked.

"Don't want to risk attracting attention with the noise."

"Let me try my key," Bastila said, the smooth _snap-hiss_ of one of her lightsaber blades igniting accompanying her words.

The two men hastily made room for her as she walked up to the door. She smirked at Kagi as she reared back and drove her blade fully into the center of the door. The metal around the point of penetration immediately glowed white-hot and began melting. Slowly, she twisted the lightsaber in her grip, causing the heat to radiate out and send chunks of melted door oozing to the ground.

Finally, she had melted away a significant portion of the door, enough for them to pass through. She pulled back her lightsaber and deactivated it, smiling proudly at her comrades.

"Impressive," Carth said.

"She learned that from me," Kagi replied, his arms crossed over his chest.

"My way was easier," she said, hooking the weapon back to her belt.

Shaking his head, the commando stepped up to the door, crouching long enough to disable the mine on the other side of the door, then stepped into the armory. He quickly began rummaging through storage containers, ignoring almost everything.

Finally, he opened up a vertical locker and looked inside, and his features immediately broke into a predatory grin. "Jackpot, baby," he said. "There's enough explosives in here to level a couple square kilometers."

"Surely you're not thinking of using _all_ of it, are you?" Bastila asked. The concern, and the fear, in her voice was evident.

He shook his head, not looking at her as he rummaged inside the locker. "Definitely not. If I blew all these explosives, I'd change the face of this planet. No, one proton core should be sufficient. We're going to have to clear out the reactor room first. I _don't_ want a stray blaster bolt hitting one of these cores and setting it off, and I wager neither of you do either."

"No argument here," Carth said.

"What is the plan?" Bastila asked as she watched Kagi pull a proton core from within the locker and gently set it on a nearby desk.

"Well, there's the gung-ho way, which I don't suggest," he replied. "There's the sneaky way, which would be very difficult, judging by the map dimensions and security camera view of the command center. And then there's the cheap way."

"The cheap way?" she asked.

Instead of answering her, Kagi lifted the comlink up and said, "Mission, can you reprogram and reactivate the droid in the corridor outside the command center?"

"_Sure, give me a second."_

They waited in silence for a moment, then something crossed Kagi's face, and he lifted the comlink again. "Wait a second, scratch that idea. I've got a better one. Could you slice in a false reactor leak? Not only would it clear out the command center, but damn near the entire base, too."

He could hear the grin in the Twi'lek's voice as she replied, _"Now _that_ is a good plan. It'll just take a sec to generate the false leak, then slice it into the sensor logs…"_

No sooner had she said this than a Klaxon alarm began to ring through the air. The trio quickly ducked into what cover they could as the doors to both the command center and the barracks slid open, allowing three Sith troopers and three officers to run as fast as they could toward the exit out into the main Taris city. Not one of them looked back at the armory.

"All too easy," Kagi said with a grin as he stepped out of cover, the proton core tucked under his left arm.

The commando made his way into the command center, wary of any Sith forces that may have been left behind. Always count on the Sith to station some unimportant grunts to guard key facilities in an eminent reactor meltdown.

Fortunately, that was not the case here; the command center was deserted. Smiling, Kagi crossed to the far side of the room, passing between the two computer stations and kneeling down between two bulbous projections on the wall.

"Coolant chambers," Carth explained to Bastila as the commando went to work. "Coolant gas is extremely combustible. The blast from that proton core would be amplified by the gas and be enough to take out this entire facility."

Bastila nodded, watching with a bit of apprehension as he worked, afraid of the consequences should he fail to rig his explosive package properly. Then, to her utter horror, she heard him mutter to himself, "Was it red, red, green or red, green, red?"

"And _he's_ supposed to be the demolitions expert?" Carth said to her, the tone in his voice indicating that Kagi's statement had been nothing but a joke.

Finally, Kagi stood up a few moments later, tucking an object into one of the pouches on his utility belt. "There, all set. All I need to do now is trigger that detonator and this place'll be scrap." He turned to his companions and grinned. "Let's go get those codes, shall we?"

The three of them made their way back toward the interrogation chamber, heading east toward the position of the elevator on the map. The Klaxon alarm cut off abruptly as they passed through; Kagi nodded appreciatively at Mission's thoughtfulness to shut off that blasted alarm.

They encountered no Sith troopers as they walked through the east corridor, and just before they reached the door at the end, Mission's voice called over the comlink, _"Remember guys, there's a big assault droid in that next room. Be careful."_

"We got it covered," Kagi replied as he primed an ion grenade in his left hand, then stuck his foot into the sensor beam of the door.

It slid open silently, and beyond, the assault droid reared up, reacting to the intruders. Quickly determining them to be hostile, it advanced toward them, see-sawing its way along using its single massive support leg and both arms for locomotion.

Before it had even begun moving, Kagi had already thrown his ready ion grenade at it. The grenade exploded against the droid's head in a shower of electrical energy, sending a wreath of bolts sparking over its form. This only momentarily slowed the droid down, and it swung one of its arms directly at the commando.

Kagi rolled under the arm, coming up behind the droid and filling its backside with blasterfire. Carth was likewise hammering it with both blaster pistols, while Bastila ducked inside its reach, the one activated blade of her lightsaber arcing up to sever the droid's arm.

Taking attacks from two sides, from both range and right in front of it, the droid screeched as its central processor, still lagged from the ion grenade, attempted to compute the best course of action for it. Meanwhile, more blasterfire hammered it, and Bastila's lightsaber curved back around, driving completely through its head.

The droid shuddered once, then collapsed to the ground, its weight tearing itself free from Bastila's lightsaber. She didn't deactivate her lightsaber; with a tilt of her head, she indicated the open elevator door behind Kagi.

Nodding, he stood and stepped into the elevator, swapping power packs for his blaster rifle as he waited for Carth and Bastila to join him. Once they were in, he pressed the engage button, steeling himself for whatever laid ahead as the elevator slowly took them down.

"Be ready for anything," he warned them.

After a moment, the elevator doors slid open again, revealing a short corridor with a closed door at the end. Rifle raised, Kagi advanced.

"Wait," Bastila whispered, laying a hand on his shoulder. "I sense a strong presence in the Force on the other side of that door," she said.

Grimly, Kagi put away his blaster rifle, drawing his combat vibroblade from its boot sheath. Carth likewise switched weapons. Kagi took a deep breath, meeting eyes with both his companions, then turned and stepped into the sensor beam.

On the other side of the door, a silver-armored man was standing up, calling a double-bladed vibrosword into his right hand from across the room. Kagi swore; this was definitely some sort of dark Jedi.

"Who dares to break my meditation?" the Sith asked. He paused, scrutinizing Kagi closely. "Wait. I sense the Force is strong in you. _Very_ strong." He laughed aloud. "Who would have thought a Force adept could be found on this insignificant planet? But your talent is no match for a disciple of the dark side!"

"Uh, yeah, right," Kagi said, flicking his vibroblade dispassionately. "Hey listen. Just for once, can we skip all the Jedi versus Sith propaganda and just get down to it?"

The Sith chuckled. "Very well. If you're so anxious to meet your end, then I shall be happy to oblige you. Certainly my master will award me with my lightsaber once I kill you."

With that, the Sith leapt forward, his vibrosword slicing through the air to come down at Kagi's head. The commando rolled out of the way, the blade passing inches above his head. Coming up on his knee, Kagi brought up his vibroblade, intending to drive it fully into the Sith's kidneys.

Anticipating his move, the Sith deftly slid one of the blades in his sword into Kagi's path, then mule-kicked the commando in the head while their blades were tangled. Turning the kick's energy into momentum, Kagi rolled back several feet, coming up into a crouch before standing and moving back into the fray.

As that was occurring, Bastila had struck at the Sith, her yellow blade casting harsh lights from his armor. The man caught her blade with his, twisting his weapon to tangle her lightsaber for just a moment, long enough for his left fist to catch her in the jaw, sending her sprawling.

Flipping his vibroblade into a reverse grip, Kagi snarled as he saw Bastila go down, leaping forward to slice open the back of the Sith's neck. But again, his enemy was one step ahead of him. The governor spun through a kick to the side of Carth's head, sending the pilot rebounding off a near wall, then turned and seized his left hand out toward Kagi.

The commando felt an invisible force grasp his body, lifting him into the air and holding him in place. The Sith smiled maliciously at him, then made a flicking gesture with his left hand. Suddenly, he found himself flying backwards at high speed, straight toward the wall of monitors that had been on the far side of the room.

He felt glass fragments and metal smash into his back and head, then darkness.

---

Bastila pulled herself to her feet, twisting her lightsaber around her hand, then rushed the Sith governor. Just as before, he easily blocked her strike. Then he twisted his body halfway around, bringing his other blade down to block Carth's blow.

Spotting an opening, Bastila suddenly surged forward, getting her right shoulder up under the governor's left elbow and pushing up with all her strength. His arm shot out of line and her lightsaber snaked in, driving itself full to the hilt in the Sith's chest.

Just as quickly, she withdrew her lightsaber as the Sith's vibrosword clattered to the floor. As Carth knelt down to search the Sith's corpse, Bastila switched off her lightsaber and attached it to her belt, a cold feeling of dread crawling into her stomach.

"Where is Kagi?" she asked quietly.

Carth glanced up at her, shrugged, and resumed his search.

A flash of color to Bastila's right drew her attention, and she looked to see Kagi crumpled on the floor, his face hidden between his arm and the grating. "No!" she cried, rushing over to his side. She dropped to her knees beside him, cringing as she saw the broken bones protruding from the back of his neck, and the pool of blood beneath him.

He wasn't moving.


	11. The Hydrospanner in the Works

**A/N:** Yes, I'm TERRIBLY evil by making all of you, my loyal readers, suffer through that dramatic cliffhanger. Trust me, my only regret was that I couldn't make it MORE dramatic. As far as chapters go, this one is rather bland. Little action, no romance. Not even any character exposition. Ugh. Anyway, it had to be done. Recommended listening is Bastila's theme for all the scenes in the med center.

* * *

Not even the Sith troopers dared to stop the group that ran through the upper city as though Death itself were hot on their heels. Perhaps it was Carth's brazenly-displayed blasters, or the 'So much as _think_ about interrupting us and I rip your arm off' look that Zaalbar was displaying. Regardless, nothing impeded the group as they made their way toward the medical center in the south city. Zaalbar carried Kagi's limp form in his arms, and Bastila ran beside him, barely paying attention to where she was going as she focused most of her energy on holding his broken spinal column firmly in place with the Force, preventing any more damage from occurring.

The party burst into the medical center, startling the protocol droid and the two human workers. Carth approached the man standing at a terminal, his back to them. "Excuse me, but we need medical assistance, now."

The man didn't even look at him. "Can't you see I'm busy with my duties? Go talk to Zelka if you need something."

"Your duties?" Carth shouted. "Your duty is to save human lives!"

"Carth, let it go," Bastila said, then turned her head toward the other man, already standing in front of her. "Can you help us, sir?"

"Zelka Forn's the name," the man replied, carefully inspecting the unconscious commando. "Severe spinal trauma. Doesn't look like he's lost any of his nerve connections or vital passageways, but that's not to say it couldn't happen. You shouldn't have moved him."

"It's alright," Bastila said, worry evident in her voice. "I've stabilized him thus far with the Force, but his injury is beyond my capacity to heal."

Zelka regarded her coolly. "A Jedi, are you?"

"Yes," she replied. "Why?"

"No time for talk," he said, turning and moving toward a sealed door on the far side of the facility. "Quickly, bring him in here."

The door slid open before them, and Bastila and Zaalbar carried Kagi in, not bothering to look around at the room. Carth, however, noticed the two humans floating in kolto tanks in the back of the room.

"Hey, those are Republic soldiers," he said.

"Yes, they are," Zelka replied, programming a kolto tank to begin filling itself with the proper mix of life-restoring fluid. "Since the space battle, people have been secretly bringing in these soldiers who crash-landed on the planet. I had to take them in. What choice did I have?"

As she waited for the kolto tank to finish filling, Bastila spared a glance to the two soldiers on the other end of the room. She knew immediately through the Force that their time was drawing to an end. She felt sorrow for them, but almost immediately, her attention was drawn back to the commando lying motionless in Zaalbar's arms. Her left hand continued to hover underneath his head, holding his head and neck firmly in place, but her right hand came up, gently brushing the scar on his forehead.

Towering above her, Zaalbar rumbled something in his language, but she did not understand Shryiiwook. If she had, she most certainly would have been displeased about his comment about how affectionate and heartwarming her attentions to the commando were.

"Their injuries are terrible," Zelka told Carth, ignoring Bastila's ministrations. "Most of them won't survive. But at least I can make their last days more comfortable. And at least here they are hidden away from the Sith."

The Republic pilot nodded solemnly, holstering his blaster pistols. "For that, you have my thanks. It's good to know that some of these men ended up in compassionate hands."

"I hate to imagine what the Sith would do if they discovered these soldiers here," Zelka said, adjusting the mix of the chemicals in the almost-full tank. "But since their initial questioning, the Sith have not returned. Perhaps my fears are unfounded."

With a liquid hiss, the kolto injectors quietly shut themselves off. Zelka turned toward Bastila and Zaalbar. "Okay, the tank's ready," he said. "You'll need to get him out of those clothes; it looks like he's been crawling around in the Undercity and all that muck will contaminate the kolto."

Bastila's eyes widened as she looked at the doctor, her cheeks flushing red. "I…what?"

Without a word, Carth approached them, tugging off Kagi's boots and setting them on the floor. His fatigue pants came next, Zaalbar adjusting his hold on the commando as the durable fabric was pulled off, leaving him in a pair of nondescript boxers. Bastila immediately turned her back, but kept her left hand, and her Force hold, in place.

Squirming in between Bastila and the commando, Carth removed his combat vest, then his armored jacket. The pilot paused as he regarded Kagi's shirt, a long-sleeved tunic that would probably cause irreparable harm if removed over his head. Shrugging, Carth reached down and retrieved Kagi's vibroblade, slicing open the front of the shirt from neck to hem, and then pulling it off from his back. As a last measure, Carth removed the commando's gloves and placed them onto his boots.

"Good, now let's get him into the tank, quickly," Zelka said.

Rumbling his assent, Zaalbar stepped forward, Bastila awkwardly following, her back still turned. As he reached the tank, the massive Wookiee lifted up his arms and carefully slid the unconscious commando into the life-restoring fluid. Bastila finally turned to face the tank, watching him float almost lifelessly within the tank.

Zelka, wearing a pair of long, sterile gloves, stepped up onto a platform and reached into the tank, affixing a sterilized breathing mask to Kagi's face. Then he turned to Bastila, whose hand was still stretched out toward the injured man. "You can let go of your Force hold now," he said. "The kolto will sustain him in his current position."

Slowly, reluctant to release her minor part in his continued survival, she lowered her hand to her side. "Thank you," she told the doctor. "What can we do to repay you?"

Zelka shook his head kindly as he stripped off the sterile gloves and tossed them into a waste bin. "No, no, think nothing of a reward, young lady," he replied. "I am a doctor; my reward is saving a life."

She gave him a watery smile. "Your profession is not so dissimilar than that of the Jedi," she said.

He smiled in return. "No, young lady, they are not so different."

"How long is he going to have to float?" Carth asked.

The doctor turned his healer's gaze toward the floating figure, regarding him steadily. "Truth be told, I'm amazed he survived such a grievous injury, even with the sustaining power of a Jedi. But now that he's in kolto, things should improve. I've not diluted the mixture any, and add to that the adrenal boosters I've mixed in, it shouldn't take too long for the bones to mend. A couple hours, perhaps. But afterwards, I strongly suggest that he be confined to a bed for several days, just to make sure that he didn't sustain any permanent neurological damage."

"What are his chances?" Bastila asked, clenching the belt of her tunic tightly.

"Very good," Zelka replied. "Like I said, by all rights he shouldn't have survived the initial injury. This young man has a remarkable will to survive."

"Is there anything we can do?" Mission asked, speaking up for the first time. Her voice and features were creased with worry.

"No, nothing to do but wait for him to recover," Zelka said. "He's capable of making a full recovery, now that we've got him stabilized. It's not like he picked up the rakghoul disease or anything."

"Rakghoul disease?" Bastila asked.

"Rakghouls are monsters down in the Undercity," Carth told her. "Kagi, Mission, and I ran into several of them down there."

"They _were_ human," Mission filled in, since she knew more about them than Carth. "But they carry some kind of bacteria or something in their bite that turns their victims into rakghouls."

The Jedi shuddered, remembering how Kagi had told her of the hazards he and Carth had braved to rescue her. She suddenly felt very undeserving, that she was not worth the hells that these men, and Mission and Zaalbar too, had suffered for her sake.

She turned around, looking at the face of the commando, distorted by the kolto tank and the breath mask. Pressing her hand to the transparisteel, she mused to herself, _You have not changed one bit. Still willing to go to extraordinary lengths to protect me, even though you, yourself, probably do not realize precisely why._ She smiled faintly as a tear broke from her right eye and ran down her cheek. _You would let the galaxy burn if only to protect me for one instant._

"Isn't there a cure for this rakghoul disease?" Carth asked Zelka, trying to pass the time.

"There is no antidote for the disease, but I have heard the Republic scientists at the military base were close to perfecting a cure. Then the Sith arrived."

Carth shook his head. "Damned Sith. All they ever do is inflict and propagate pain and suffering."

Zelka nodded in agreement. "They overran the military base and now they refuse to allow anyone access to the laboratories inside. The Sith are keeping all the serum for the patrols they send into the Undercity." He clenched his hands into fists, then sighed. "If I could just get my hands on a sample of that serum, the rakghoul disease could be wiped from the face of Taris forever. But I don't see how that's going to happen."

"Perhaps we could get a sample of that serum for you?" Bastila asked, turning toward the conversation.

The doctor's expression was a mixture of surprised horror and curiosity. "I don't see how anyone could get their hands on the serum," he said. "The military base is crawling with Sith guards. Breaking in there would be a suicide mission."

_Actually, it wasn't that difficult,_ Bastila thought to herself, then immediately winced, looking over at the floating commando in the tank beside her. _No, it was difficult. Too difficult…_

"I suppose the Sith patrols in the Undercity might have a sample of the serum on them," Zelka mused aloud, "if they hadn't already used it because of a rakghoul infection. But a patrol wouldn't just hand over the serum, and nobody's stupid enough to attack the Sith patrols, even in the Undercity."

"We'll get a sample of that serum for you, Zelka," Carth said, taking the words right out of Bastila's mouth before she could say them. "It's the least we can do to repay you."

"Please don't say that," the doctor replied, alarmed. "If the Sith hear you, they might think I'm encouraging you to start attacking their patrols. They could shut me down."

"You know," Mission piped up, "I think me and Big Z left some unfinished business in the Undercity."

The Wookiee growled an interrogative, but the young girl ignored it.

"Carth, you want to come with us?" she asked.

For a moment, the pilot looked at her in confusion, then her hidden meaning dawned on him, and he nodded once. "Sure, Mission. You never can have enough blasters in a dangerous place like that." He looked at Bastila. "Commander? Will you be alright here by yourself?"

She smiled at their discreet plotting. "Yes, I'll be fine. I'll stay and keep an eye on Kagi, so you three go finish whatever you need to do."

Carth nodded to her, then the three of them left the medical center. Zelka sighed theatrically. "Nothing but trouble's going to come out of this, mark my words," he said.

Bastila smiled slightly and turned toward him. "So, Doctor Forn, your opinion of the Sith is obviously not very high."

Zelka nodded, deciding it would be best for both of them to simply find something to do to pass the time until either the commando was healed or the others returned from their errand. He picked up two folding chairs from against the wall and handed one to Bastila, then unfolded the other and seated himself in it.

As Bastila sat down in her chair, he said, "I know enough to be scared of them. I've heard about the brutality of the Sith. I know what they do to planets they conquer. So far, all they've done is ask me general questions, but I'm afraid they might one day decide to shut this facility down out of evil spite." He shrugged helplessly. "I guess there's not much I can do about the Sith, except hope that the Republic can stop their conquest of the galaxy."

Bastila smiled, reaching forward and patting his knee. "Rest assured that the Republic, and the Jedi, are doing all that we can to stop the Sith," she said. "But sometimes, I am not sure if we will succeed."

Zelka nodded. "You just keep doing what you have to do, Miss, and I'm sure everything will fall into place."

She nodded back, then glanced to the floating form of the commando. She didn't think she'd be able to spend several hours just sitting there, watching him try to heal. She forced her attention back to the doctor. "Since we have so much time available, could I bother you to tell me a little about Taris?"

Pausing to check the monitor attached to the kolto tank, Zelka replied, "I don't know much, but I'll tell you what I can. What do you wish to know about? Upper Taris? Or are you more interested in the Lower and Undercities?"

"Tell me about Upper Taris," she said, getting as comfortable as she could.

He nodded. "The people here in the Upper City like to think they're better than the rest of Taris, but we're no better than anybody else…"

---

The gate leading back into the village in the Undercity slammed shut behind them with a semblance of finality. The trio looked around the wasteland cautiously, keeping alert for any potential ambushes by rakghouls.

"Looks clear," Carth said. "Where do you think–"

"You there! Civilians!"

Carth turned to see a trio of armored Sith troopers approaching them. "Great…" he muttered.

"Let me handle this," Mission said, stepping to the front of the group as the Sith troopers stopped in front of them.

"This is a restricted area," the Sith leader said as he and his men stopped a few meters from them. "What are you doing down here?"

"We've got the proper papers to be here," Mission replied coolly, gesturing to Carth, who quickly produced them.

The trooper gave the papers a quick glance. "Oh, you're that tracker group the Commander sent down," he said. "They should have given you an armed escort, it's nasty down here."

"What's the problem?" the Twi'lek girl asked, assuming a haughty, Upper City pose.

"We've lost a patrol already," the trooper replied, then shrugged. "Probably rakghouls. We've had so many encounters with the beasts that we've actually run out of serum."

Mission and Carth exchanged a glance. "Where was this patrol when you lost contact?" Carth asked.

"Ah, you're here for search and rescue, are you?" the trooper asked, nodding admirably. "I didn't think they'd send anyone. Well, no matter. They were in the southern part of the Undercity when we lost contact."

"Thanks for the information," Mission said. "We'll let you get back to your patrol."

"Thank _you_ for helping out," he replied, then turned and led his men away.

Zaalbar rumbled something. "You're right, Big Z," Mission said. "He was pretty nice for a Sith."

"Do you know how to get where he was talking about?" Carth asked.

"Are banthas furry?" she shot back with a grin. She turned and started walking toward the east, hugging the wall of the village. "Follow me."

Carth and Zaalbar followed behind her, both of them keeping their eyes open for any marauding rakghouls. As they came to an outward projection in the wall, Mission stopped suddenly, waving her two companions to flatten themselves against the wall. As they did so, Carth understood why; he could hear the growling and snarling of a number of rakghouls on the other side of the wall.

"Stay here," Mission said quietly.

"What are you going to do?" the pilot hissed.

"Trust me," she said with a grin, then vanished.

At least, she mostly vanished. Where she had been standing, Carth could faintly make out ripples of air as the stealth field generator used holocams to record what was on one side of Mission, then display that visual data on the exact opposite side of the stealth field.

Carth shook his head slowly, but knew that Mission's idea was probably for the best. He tightened his grip on his blaster pistols and prayed to the Force.

For her part, Mission crept around the corner, watching five different rakghouls saunter around the area. There were two corpses on the ground in their midst, both of them in various states of decay, both of them showing clear signs of being eaten from.

She blanched at the smell, suddenly glad she hadn't had anything to eat in a long time. A flash of movement from her left caused her to freeze in place, as a rakghoul hunch-stepped up to her and sniffed the air cautiously. She could feel her _lekku_ twitching, knowing that the thing could smell her, but the fact that it couldn't _see_ her was confusing it to no end.

After a moment, the rakghoul growled in irritation and stomped off. Letting out a silent sigh of relief, Mission crept slowly forward, stopping at the body of the Sith trooper and kneeling down. As silently as she could, she began to search the corpse. She ignored the soldier's rifle and armor, focusing on the contents of its all-purpose utility belt.

Her search produced two medpacs and two antidote kits, which she slipped into a pouch on her own armor. Another pouch produced a beam splitter, which she was sure Kagi would appreciate being added to his own rifle. Afraid to turn the body over, for fear of attracting the rakghouls, Mission carefully reached around to its underside, poking and prodding the pouches. Finally, she got a hold of something, grabbed it, and pulled it back around.

Her eyes fell upon an injector kit, half the length of her forearm, filled with a shimmering green liquid. A number of score marks along the side of the vial marked treatment doses. She smiled. Mission complete.

Tucking the serum into her armor, Mission stood and crept back toward her comrades, anxious to be away from the rakghouls. But suddenly, as she approached, she saw one of the wandering rakghouls move into the line of sight of Zaalbar and Carth, and immediately charge toward them, letting out a loud roar as it did so.

The two immediately opened fire on it, burning it down before it could take two steps. Around and behind her, Mission could see and hear the other rakghouls moving toward the source of the disturbance. She swung out her right hand, the weight of the blaster pistol catching it completely unaware and flipping it over onto its back. She discharged a bolt of scarlet energy into its face, putting it down quickly.

Another rakghoul made it around the corner that her friends were behind, and she heard Zaalbar's roar of anger, followed by a surprised squeal and the sound of flesh tearing. Carth stepped around the corner, his blaster pistols blazing, sending a fourth rakghoul crashing to the ground. Mission whirled around, firing as she did so. The weight of a rakghoul slammed into her, smashing her to the ground.

"Mission!" Carth shouted, running up and kicking the beast off of her. It flopped over onto its back beside her, dead, a hole burned through its chest.

The Twi'lek girl switched off her stealth field generator and laid there, with rakghoul slime smeared over her armor. "I need a bath," she muttered.

"We all do," Carth replied, pulling her to her feet. "Any luck?"

Grinning, she produced the injector she had taken from the dead Sith. The vial was still full. "They must've gotten the drop on him," she said. "Dead before he could use any."

"All the better for us," he replied, looking around. "Come on, let's get out of here. The less time we have to spend in this dump, the better."

---

Bastila had actually fallen asleep after she had exhausted all available topics of conversation with Zelka. She woke with a start when she heard voices in the main room. With a glance to make sure that Kagi was still in the kolto tank, she stood up and opened the door out of the back room.

"…did you get this?" Zelka was asking Carth, holding a long injection kit in his hands. He shook his head. "Nevermind, I don't want to know." He turned it over, prying some part of it open and extracting a vial from within. "Excellent! This is definitely the cure for the rakghoul disease! With this sample, I can make enough serum for everybody!"

"We're just glad that we could have helped," Bastila said, leaning against the door frame.

Zelka turned to her and smiled, his expression still overjoyed. "The people of Taris owe you all a great debt," he said. He gently set the serum down on a table in front of him, reaching for some other medical supplies on its surface. "Please, take this small reward. It isn't much, but it's all I can afford. A few credits and two spare medpacs."

Bastila shook her head once, holding her hand palm-out toward him. "No, keep the reward," she said. "Your treating our friend is payment enough, and you will need those supplies more than we will."

"You truly have a noble and generous spirit, Miss," Zelka replied. "But you deserve something for your efforts. Just for you, I'll waive the usual charge for your friend's extensive treatment. And I'll do you one better: I'll also give you a discount whenever you shop at my store. It's the least I can do."

"Thank you," Bastila said, smiling warmly. She then turned and walked back to the chair she'd spent who-knew how long in, but didn't sit in it yet. She decided she needed to stretch her legs some more.

"How's he doing?" Carth asked as he walked into the treatment room.

"He's getting better," she replied, closing her eyes as she reached out with the Force and touched his living essence. "It may still be a while, though."

"Hmm. Well, we're eventually going to have to get these codes to Canderous," Carth said, tapping the pocket on his jacket that contained the datapad. "Otherwise he may think we stiffed him."

"You're right," she said, pacing in front of the two dying Republic soldiers. "We will have to give him those codes, so that he can accomplish whatever purpose he's seeking."

The pilot raised an eyebrow. "And by 'we' you mean anyone but you, right?"

She shot him a look. "I told you before that I am going to stay here and look after Kagi," she said crossly. "So can I ask the three of you to go give him those codes?"

Carth sighed and shook his head. "Alright, we'll do it. We'll be back." He turned around. "Mission? Zaalbar? Let's go. We're going to take Canderous those launch codes."

Zaalbar growled something in his own language. "Big Z says he doesn't want to go this time," Mission translated. "He says he wants to stay here in case something should happen to Kagi."

Carth sighed again. "Fine," he said. "Are you coming at least?"

She nodded.

"Good. We'll bring T3 along as well, just to round it out."

A quick exchange of goodbyes later, and the trio had departed. Zaalbar walked over to stand in front of the kolto tank, staring in at the man to whom he owed a life debt. He rumbled something that Bastila didn't understand, but it sounded, at least to her ears, mournful.

---

"Where's your friend?" Canderous asked, glaring at Carth.

"We had a little accident," he replied, seating himself at the Mandalorian's table. "He's been injured, and he's getting treatment. But we brought you the launch codes you wanted."

Carth produced the datapad, which Canderous leaned forward to take. The pilot pulled it out of his reach. "Ah, ah. Our deal, Canderous."

The Mandalorian scowled. "My original plan was to take your friend to Davik's base so we could steal his ship and have a better chance of fighting our way out. But frankly, I don't know how a Republic, a Twi'lek girl, and a droid could be of any help to me." He took a gulp of the bronze liquid in his tall glass. "Or how I could even convince him to let you in, for that matter."

"Tell him that we're Kagi's bodyguards," Mission said. "That we're there to check the place out and make sure everything is cool before he shows up."

Canderous gave her a look he normally reserved for someone he found painting his Mandalorian combat armor a bright shade of pink. "And in just the time it took you to come up with that excuse, Davik would see right through it. He's not an idiot, you know."

"I didn't see _you_ offering up any ideas," Carth said, eyes narrowed. "But then again, you Mandalorians were never known for your finesse and subtlety."

"Now you listen here, you filthy _di'kut_!" Canderous snapped, slamming his glass on the table's surface. "If I catch you making one more comment like that, I'll skin you and use your kidneys to oil my armor." He settled back in his chair, glaring turbolasers at the Republic pilot as he said to Mission, "I _suppose_ your little idea might work, if I put the right spin on it. Now, if you're interested, I can take you to Davik's estate right now."

"How are we going to get inside?" Carth asked.

"Davik's always looking for new recruits," Canderous replied. "I'll tell him your friend is interested, but he sent two of his lieutenants to check things out first, make sure it's the kind of arrangement he wants to get into. He'll want to check all of your backgrounds, and you'd need to stay a couple days for that. And while Davik is checking you out, we steal the _Ebon Hawk_ and escape. Pick up the rest of your friends from wherever they're at, and get off this rock."

"Sounds good to me," Mission said, nodding agreeably.

"Me, too," Carth said.

"It's settled then," Canderous replied, fishing in his pockets for a few credits, which he laid on the table. "Come on, I've got an airspeeder waiting to take us there. The sooner we get off Taris, the better."


End file.
